Different from You: Renewal
by Traitor of All Traitors
Summary: A different beginning for a young man and his little girl. Say Shinji stayed in Tokyo-3, but not without terms? Say he fought against the Angels, but only because he had someone he wanted to protect from danger. Say this someone was all he had as a reason to believe in life being worth living?
1. Renewal

Creation began on 05-19-16

Creation ended on 05-20-16

Neon Genesis Evangelion

Different from You: Renewal

A/N: Here's a revitalized version of the original story of a young man and his little girl.

Shinji awoke after what felt like a horrid nightmare he had been trying to wake up from. He found himself in a sparse, white room that had a stale smell to it. The events of the previous day echoing in his mind: His father, after over a decade of neglect, sends for him, only to force try and force him into a conflict that he knew absolutely nothing about, and he wanting nothing to do with the problem this NERV agency was facing because he, a young man with his own measure of responsibility, had his own priorities to deal with, but obliged the paramilitary agency's need of him only because of his own concern for what was important to him, not their concerns or their desire to live to see tomorrow.

"Shado?" He called out, his voice weakened from his exhaustion as he got up. "I hate unfamiliar ceilings. They're never the same."

As he got out of bed, the door to the room opened, and a woman in her late-twenties or early-thirties came in, sporting a short, black dress, a red coat and purple hair. This was Misato Katsuragi, the woman that had been tasked with picking him up to meet his father. And beside her was…

"Daddy!" A little girl cheered, running past Misato and over to Shinji. "Are you okay?"

She had to be at least around four years old, dressed in a green coat and blue skort, with short, ebony hair and pale eyes of the same coloring as the young teen in front of her.

"I'm fine," he assured the girl that was, despite what everyone that had been around to even bother with being freaked about, his child.

"This is just too weird," Misato expressed, and Shinji frowned at her; she was ruining the pair's happy moment. "How can she be your daughter?"

"That's none of your business," Shinji responded; if she couldn't understand it, then she was better of not knowing because it was a tormenting experience that left him with a lack of peace of mind and stability. "Where are my clothes from earlier?"

-x-

"…First Unit-00, and now Unit-01," went Kiel Lorenz to Gendo Ikari during their sanctioned meeting to discuss the Third Angel incident. "The costs needed to repair both of them will be as much as a small nation."

"And you made your son pilot it?" A man bathed in yellow light questioned Gendo.

"Time, money, and personnel," a man bathed in red light expressed. "Exactly, just how much of these must be wasted by your family, Ikari?"

"And what's this we hear about the boy having a little girl to look after?" A man in green asked. "How is this possible?"

"Unforeseen circumstances," Gendo answered him; in truth, he had no idea of how his son had father any children with anyone. "This will not, however, hinder anything."

"It had better not, Ikari," went Kiel to him. "It's not just the matter of the Angels' return. Our primary concern must be the Instrumentality Project. To us, this above all else, promises any actual hope in these desperate times. We'll not have anything, from the second return of the Angels…or the 'unforeseen circumstances' of a little kid associated with your son, delay this project. We may consider adjusting your budget requests."

"Understood, sir," Gendo responded.

-x-

"I swear, this place is a labyrinth," Shinji uttered, trying to find the exit to this hospital-like environment he and Shado were in.

"Daddy…we're not going back to that house that man's relatives lived in, are we?" Shado asked him, referring to his father's in-laws; she was only four years old, and already had an opinion of the Ikari adults that were her father's aunt and uncle and their son.

"No, sweetie," he answered her with a smile. "No matter what, we're never going back there. I don't think we could go back there, even if we wanted to. It wasn't welcoming for either of us."

"Hello, you two," the young father turned towards an open stairway and saw an elderly man in a brownish suit. "I'm Kozo Fuyutsuki."

Shado, being held by Shinji, held onto her father as she expressed a mild fear of the elder in front of them.

"What do you want, sir?" Shinji asked him.

"Just to try and convince you to consider to stay in Tokyo-3," Fuyutsuki answered back.

"If this has anything to do with those creatures you call Angels, I'm going to have to put my foot down and decline. They're not my problem, nor should they be my problem. Now, either show the way out of here or step aside."

"But, surely, we can reach an agreement of sorts that can be acceptable for both you and NERV," Fuyutsuki suggested; his orders from Gendo were to try and persuade Shinji to stay and help them against the Angels, by whatever means necessary, because there was no way he would waste his time trying to reach an understanding with him…and because they needed to understand the relationship between the boy and the girl.

"There's nothing to agree on. I don't even know you, let alone trust you around my daughter for more than two minutes."

-x-

"…This guy's different from his old man," said Aoba Shigeru as he and the other technicians in Central Dogma watched through the medical ward's surveillance cameras the meeting between Shinji and Sub-Commander Fuyutsuki. "He doesn't want to get involved, even when our future's at stake."

"Yet, he seems to care a lot for that little girl," expressed Maya Ibuki, still wondering how the Third Child could be a father himself at his age. "She does seem to resemble him a little."

"Can you really go home and forget about all of this, Mr. Ikari?" Fuyutsuki asked Shinji.

"Please," went Shinji in response to this address, "don't call me that. I'm not my father. I hate it when people try to compare me to him, just because we're related. He's a sore loser in my book, and I want nothing to do with him…or want him anywhere near my daughter."

"Ouch," said Makoto Hyuga.

Ritsuko Akagi, also watching as the conversation took place, pondered how to convince the boy to stay and help them.

"My apologies," Fuyutsuki expressed. "He's not well-liked here, either."

-x-

"Well?" Gendo asked Fuyutsuki as the Sub-Commander returned to his office later that day. "Were you successful?"

Fuyutsuki sighed and answered, "Not successful…but Shinji has considered staying awhile. However, he enforced that his primary concern is his daughter, not any of us. He's not even at all concerned for your well-being."

"So long as he pilots the Eva, what he feels doesn't matter."

"It will if she is harmed. He's already made it clear to me that he doesn't trust anyone, his age or older, around Shado. He claims he has Yui's relatives to thank for that."

-x-

It was actually the only apartment within the list of buildings owned by NERV that met the requirements for Shinji. So long as his daughter was permitted to stay with him and was kept out of harm's way, he would offer his service to NERV in exchange for their right to actually have a life together. It was a small, two bedroom unit that had the needs of a parent and child, and Shinji was the type of young man that didn't ask for too much in terms of material possessions. Nothing material could come between him and his daughter's well-being.

-x-

"…So he's agreed to stay for awhile?" Misato asked Ritsuko over the phone whilst taking a hot bath.

"Yes, but he's made it clear that he doesn't want any of us laying uninvited hands on his daughter," the faux-blond explained, "and I found out why he views those around her and himself with distrust. The girl is his biological daughter, but her mother had an impact on him that he didn't recover from."

"What are you talking about?"

"Five years ago, he was kidnapped by a woman with the aid of her brother and best friend. He was missing for three days, and his maternal relatives weren't exactly very intuitive or caring on who kidnapped him and why; if it was a ransom, they weren't willing to pay for his return. The police found him, but the damage had already been done. His daughter's the product of the damage that was inflicted upon him."

"You're saying…the woman that kidnapped him…raped him?" Misato questioned.

"Yes, Misato," Ritsuko answered her. "She raped him…and got pregnant by him. It's quite unusual that she was able to, given his prepubescence at the time of his kidnapping. Refused to get an abortion, had the baby in prison and died a week later in a riot. Because the brother was also in prison and their other relatives were dead, the girl was handed over to the Ikaris, since they were also her relatives by blood. I guess you could say that the boy accepted what had happened to be a sign of hope for him. The others, though, didn't take to the girl as he did."

"The boy distrusts adults and other people his age, but he accepts that he fathered a child with a woman old enough to be his own mother? How damaged is he?"

-x-

 _"Daddy,"_ Shinji recalled his daughter's question to him one day before they left to Tokyo-3. _"That man with the bad look on his face called me something I don't understand. What is a_ _…_ _bastard child?"_

There was no love between Shinji and his maternal relatives at all. Not then, not ever. And his uncle calling his daughter a bastard just because she was a child out of wedlock, not that he was planning on getting married after what he went through as a child whose innocence was stolen from him. And then returned to the very people that didn't even bother to ask him if he was okay.

"Daddy?" He heard his daughter call out to him, breaking him from his train of thought to looking at his little girl as she lay in her futon as he sat beside it to keep watch over her. "Are you alright?"

"I'm fine, sweetie," he answered her; she was actually the only person he knew and trusted that ever took his feelings into consideration. "You should get some sleep. I'm hoping for you to have a good day tomorrow."

"You sleep, too, Daddy?"

"After you sleep."

-x-

"…So how was Rei today?" Ritsuko asked Gendo, as they overlooked the damaged Unit-00 in the damaged chamber half-filled with melted Bakelite. "You did see her at the hospital, didn't you?"

"She can work in thirty days," Gendo responded. "By that time, we'll be able to reactivate Unit-00 and will have obtained Unit-02 and the Second Child."

"Provided that NERV doesn't do anything to cause the Third Child to leave, that is."

This, of course, had Gendo irritated, and found his perception of the little girl that came with him to be a challenge because of the way she looked. If anyone had been smart enough to ask him, the girl Shinji called Shado looked like a splitting reflection of Yui Ikari, only little and more innocent to look at. But Gendo felt like her presence here could actually cause more trouble for him than anything or anyone else could in the future, just because she looked like someone he loved more than anything else in existence.

"What do we have on the girl?" He asked Ritsuko.

"Everything there is to know about her from her genetic background to her diet…but the only person that probably knows her better than anyone…is the girl's father." Ritsuko explained.

Gendo's left hand balled into a fist; it seemed that every time he tried to find a way to tip a situation in his favor, it showed signs of the potential to backfire in his face.

"It surprises you that he was capable of something like this, even if it was against his will?" Ritsuko asked him.

"Nothing of this sort…was supposed to happen in the years leading up to the present," he responded back.

"For someone that doesn't think about his kid, you seem to be thinking about his kid. How long do you think it will be until she decides to keep her distance from you? Assuming she's not aware of the type of person you are?"

Gendo didn't answer her.

To be continued…

A/N: Well, here's a new beginning to a recently-finished story. What do any of you suspect will happen later in this remake?


	2. Work and Play

Creation began on 05-20-16

Creation ended on 05-21-16

Neon Genesis Evangelion

Different from You: Work and Play

"…Why is she here?" Fuyutsuki asked Ritsuko, three days later, referring to Shado Ikari, who sat in the corner of the large room that overlooked the rest of the staff and electronic equipment present in front of the large Unit-01 that had Shinji inside it.

"Believe it or not, the Third Child brought her with him," she answered him; many of the staff had even started a pool on how long the Third Child and his daughter would be staying around before something went wrong to cause them to leave (and most of the pool centered around Commander Ikari trying something to drive one or the other away). "Apparently, he has trust issues that are severe."

"I hope you know, I heard all of that," the speaker uttered with Shinji's voice; someone had neglected to turn off the communication link between the room and the Entry Plug.

"Uh, Shinji, this isn't a daycare center we're running here," Fuyutsuki tried to explain to the young father. "You couldn't have asked someone your age to watch her?"

On the monitor, Shinji's facial expression showed anger where it used to show calmness as he responded, "The day I start to trust people will be the day they don't try something to get rid of Shado or myself. She's not bothering any of you as long as she's sitting somewhere not in your way, so don't start something over nothing."

Unfortunately, as much as Fuyutsuki wanted to speak back at him about the severity of what they did at NERV, he couldn't help but be reminded of how similar this was to what had occurred almost a decade ago, back when Yui was alive. Only it was the reverse of a mother and son. This time, it was a father and daughter. He turned to look at Shado, who simply stayed quiet and watched them all.

Or rather, she was ignoring them in favor of the one person she trusted that was, in her mind, an adult.

"She hasn't moved from the chair I asked her to sit in, has she?" Shinji asked.

"No, she hasn't," Fuyutsuki answered, seeing no point in arguing with him over nothing.

"Then there's nothing wrong."

Of course, that was only Shinji's belief. But one that had some truth to it. His daughter hadn't really made a move to ask any one of them for anything that her father hadn't already left in a bag with her.

-x-

"So far, his synchronization ratio is holding at seventy-two percent," Ritsuko informed Gendo in his office later that day. "However, it lowered by three percent when Sub-Commander Fuyutsuki questioned why his daughter was here, then returned to where it was later."

However, this was like memory lane for Gendo, as well. The fact that his son brought his daughter with him here was no different from when Yui had brought him here to watch the critical experiment with Unit-01 (back then, it was Unit-00, requiring another Eva to be built later). Only this time, it was for a different test with a different outcome. A little girl got to see her father survive a sync test with a cybernetic organism…and would be going home with him later on.

"Was there any other cause for concern?" He asked Ritsuko.

"Other than Fuyutsuki questioning the little girl's presence, nothing that could've ignited the Third Child's anger," she answered him, and then noticed a picture of the commander's granddaughter and another picture of the First Child, realizing that both girls almost resembled one another in terms of their hairstyle and facial structure, which wasn't all that different from the Third Child's, either.

Gendo took notice and merely said, "It's plausible that the Third Child will demonstrate some trust in the First Child and install a similar trust with his daughter."

"Except that he hasn't been too concerned with anyone else besides his daughter since they moved into that small apartment. If anything, sir, his priorities seem to include his daughter and exclude nearly everything…and everyone…else."

-x-

So far, this park in Tokyo-3 was the only one that included a playground for little kids that included a swing set. None of the other two parks Shinji and Shado had found had such things as playgrounds for the girl. And while the girl loved jungle gyms, she preferred the swings because it was one of the only things she and her father bonded over…and because not many other children her age wanted anything to do with her, leaving Shinji as her only playmate when he had time to spend with her each day.

As far as Shinji noticed, with the exception of the Geo-Front, much of the city itself was empty. One night, in fact, he left the side of a sleeping Shado to see how much of the city was empty; it must've been the shortest three hours he ever spent on the streets of a new place that he felt no attachment towards. It made him wonder if there was any actual life in the city.

"Daddy?" Shado asked.

"Yes, dear?" He responded.

"Are we bad?"

"No, of course not, sweetie. What gave you that impression?"

As the small swing slowed down, the girl explained, "We've been looked at differently by others ever since we got here. The elderly man, the lady with the fake hair and the lady with the purple hair. They seem to have a hard time accepting what we are to each other."

Shinji sighed and expressed, "You remember what I said almost a year ago to that woman that tried to get you into the oven? About how there's no point in living if anything happened to you?"

"Yeah. You told her that if she tried something like that again with me…you wouldn't hesitate to make her regret her decision to mistreat me the way she did."

"The same can apply to everyone here, Shado. You're the only reason I have for doing any of the things I do anywhere. Nothing else matters. If anything were to happen to you, there would be no reason to go on living. You're the light in my life, and I wouldn't trade you for anything."

"I wouldn't trade you for anything, either. You're my best friend."

-x-

"…If either ever knew NERV was keeping surveillance over them whenever they were outside their apartment or the base," went Ritsuko to Misato, watching the teen father and his toddler daughter through a camera in the playground.

"This is a complete invasion of privacy, but this is to ensure that Shinji is kept safe from harm," Misato expressed, seeing how it seemed that the pair were rather isolated from everyone, but not so much as by choice as they seemed to be by a bad hand of cards they were dealt by others. "Do we have any other information on their maternal relatives, Rits?"

"Nothing we haven't been informed before these two showed up," she answered, zooming the camera lens on Shado, who was no longer on the swing set, but now on the merry-go-round being pulled into motion by her young father. "What do you think he meant by a woman trying to get his daughter into an oven?"

"You don't wanna know."

To be continued…

A/N: I actually wanted to have Shinji sang to Shado the song _Look What We've Become_ byGrace Potter from her album _Midnight_ , but I wasn't sure how to go about it. I just heard the song and immediately liked it a lot. Can anyone guess what Shinji meant by what almost happened to Shado in this reboot?


	3. Mental Beatings

Creation began on 05-21-16

Creation ended on 05-26-16

Neon Genesis Evangelion

Different from You: Mental Beatings

The Fourth Angel had finally arrived. Unfortunately, it had arrived ahead of their schedule, leaving NERV at a disadvantage.

Shinji was dispatched in Unit-01, instructed to deal with the Angel, but his response to the orders weren't carried out the way Misato had intended him to do so. The Pallet Rifle didn't cause the Angel any damage, and it counterattacked with these energy whips.

"Dammit, Shinji," Misato shouted in Central Dogma over the intercom. "Retreat! Retreat!"

-x-

Shinji, knocked to the ground in Unit-01, looked up at the Angel and saw not the monster it was…but the man he hated for abandoning him years ago…and the woman that raped him years ago.

"Gaaaaurgh!" He yelled, and made Unit-01 dash towards the Angel.

Before it could retaliate, it was slammed into and smashed into a hillside!

BASH! BASH! Unit-01 was punching the Angel in its core!

-x-

"What the Hell?" Misato gasped, seeing the Eva grab at the Angel's whips, tearing them away from the body so that it could resume bashing the core that began to crack under the blows.

"He needs to stop," Ritsuko informed Misato. "His synchronization's going too high."

"Shinji, stop!" Misato ordered, but Shinji just kept bashing away at the Angel. "Shinji, I order you to stop! Stop!"

CRACK! The Angel's core cracked and fell to pieces, causing the creature to perform a death rattle before laying around like a dead animal.

When it gave no indication that it was alive, Shinji calmed; he didn't see his father or his rapist in front of him, just a strange creature he had stopped before it did something to hurt his daughter. He buried his face in his palms as he panted.

 _Dammit,_ he thought.

-x-

Sitting in a chair outside the locker room her father was in, Shado, who didn't see the fight between the red squid and purple behemoth her father had been inside, wondered if he was alright.

Misato came by and asked her, "Is he still in there?"

Shado didn't answer her, neither a verbal response or a shake of her head.

The woman decided to go into the locker room and see if he was in there, and to her luck, he was in there, putting on his coat.

"You disobeyed a direct order given to you by your superior officer," she informed.

"I was ordered to fight the Angel," he responded, his voice sounding ragged. "I fought the Angel."

"Next time, you're expected to follow orders, Shinji."

"Not every order can be followed."

"Are you even listening to me?"

He closed the locker and looked at her, and she almost had to step back; she had never seen him looking so irritated before.

"What does it matter?" He asked her. "I stopped the Angel. I kept Shado out of harm's way. That's all that matters to me. Anyone else is a secondary concern…or at the very bottom of my list of concerns."

Before she could even express that that attitude of his would get them all killed (or even himself killed), he walked past her and out into the hall. She followed him and saw him leave with his daughter on his back.

"Daddy, are you okay?" Shado had asked him.

"I'll be alright, sweetie," he responded to her.

Misato was now worried that NERV had entrusted the fate of the human race to the wrong person.

-x-

"…Before he got back up, his synchronization raised to ninety-seven percent," Maya Ibuki informed Ritsuko, Misato and Fuyutsuki of what had transpired in the last battle, showing them the Third Child's recorded graphs. "Then, it went over one-hundred-twenty while he was beating the Angel. It didn't stop rising until he was done pounding on the core. Then, it dropped back to the seventies. It gets worse."

"How could it get worse?" Misato asked her.

"His blood pressure and brainwaves were becoming unstable, almost bordering on emotional instability, similar to what happened with the First Child several months ago."

"Emotional instability? With Shinji?" Misato questioned.

"It wouldn't be illogical," went Ritsuko. "It was similar with the initial Angel attack. He was more disturbed than usual. When the Angel self-destructed, we had to disconnect his nerve connections before he passed out."

"There's something else, too," Maya showed them a holographic display. "The visual equipment inside the plug was affected by his synchronization…and this was what he saw in place of the Angel."

The display showed Commander Ikari…and a woman that had been identified as Shinji's rapist.

"His synchronization rose up because he saw these two?" Fuyutsuki questioned.

"That's a possibility," Ritsuko expressed. "It would seem that out of everyone he's ever seen, he has a lot of unchecked rage towards his father and his rapist."

-x-

She never made him angry or anything. Shado always managed to quell his rage that always seemed to be triggered by anyone that tried to tell him how to do things. Ever since the police just showed up at his aunt and uncle's and informed him of his fatherhood caused by his rapist, he was the only one that wanted anything to do with Shado because he fell in love with her right then and there. So she was his anchor, she kept him tethered to his sanity every time he felt like he had a mental beating weighing him down.

"Ha-ha-ha!" Shado laughed as her father pushed her on the swing at the park. "Higher, Daddy!"

"Heh-heh," he chuckled, and obliged her request.

-x-

"…If anything, his daughter seems to keep him from going off the deep end," went Misato, observing the young father and his daughter at the playground.

"He practically lives for her," said Fuyutsuki; any parent with a loss for life dedicate themselves to their children as a way of coping with their remaining years or as a sign of redemption by making sure that they had a future where they could be happy, even if they weren't.

They were monitoring the scene in Central Dogma.

"He beats an Angel to death with an Eva's bare hands," expressed Maya, "but still finds time to spend the rest of the day with his daughter."

"We should consider retesting him in the plug," said Ritsuko, wanting to test the boy again to see if his synchronization was not a fluke or error.

"Maybe not for a few days," went Fuyutsuki.

"Yeah, he wasn't a very talkative person when I tried to question him about the way he fought the Angel," Misato added, agreeing with the Sub-Commander. "I doubt that he'd comply at the moment."

Across the chamber, several of the other technicians were still reeling in from the Third Child's actions against the Angel and his apparent rage. Despite the use of the rifle, it looked like the boy seemed to get the job done faster by using his natural weapons: His fists.

"He rarely seems to embrace violence," went Maya. "How can someone that does what he does for his kid be capable of violence? I mean, violent hands can't hold children."

Misato wanted to disagree with the Bridge Bunny, but the sight of Shinji removing his daughter from the swing so that they could go to the jungle gym kept her silent; throughout the relocation, the young parent never tried to use force to relocate his daughter from one part of the playground to another.

"He could displace his rage," Ritsuko suggested, "redirecting it elsewhere to refrain from being abusive towards others."

"He seemed to redirect his rage towards me when I questioned him," Misato stated. "I didn't want to imagine what he'd be most likely to do to me if he he put his hands on me."

-x-

"…The Fourth Angel arrived ahead of time, Ikari," said SEELE 01 to Gendo during the new meeting. "And the only Eva dispatched against it was Unit-01, which defeated the Angel by beating its core to a fractured pulp."

"This was an unexpected situation," Gendo explained. "However, the situation was handled and the Angel was defeated."

"It's not the Angel we're concerned about," said SEELE 06 to Gendo. "It's the, seemingly, unpredictability of the Angels and the unreliability of the pilot."

"Who beats an Angel with their fists?" SEELE 10 asked.

Gendo explained that the pilot reacted under desperation and was under pressure. It was a lie, but he didn't really know what made the Third Child act the way he did against the Angel. From the recorded footage of the attack and the information of the raised synchronization ratio of the pilot, he began to wonder if it was even safe for him to be anywhere near Tokyo-3 during any of these attacks. He needed to make plans to excuse himself from the base and city in order to further the Human Instrumentality Project that SEELE stressed him about.

To be continued…

A/N: What do you think? Shinji makes the NERV personnel fearful just because he punches an Angel to death?


	4. Think before Act

Creation began on 05-28-16

Creation ended on 07-13-16

Neon Genesis Evangelion

Different from You: Think before Act

It was a nightmare for NERV right now. Bad enough that the Fourth Angel had shown up before they were fully prepared to deal with impending attacks, but now the Fifth Angel had shown up three days after it.

"You're joking, right?" Misato questioned Ritsuko in Central Dogma as they and the rest of the bridge crew saw the Angel approaching the city.

"I wish I was," the faux-blond expressed. "This Angel looks like a giant diamond."

"How are we on Unit-01?"

"The pilot isn't inside the plug yet," Maya revealed to Misato.

"What?! But it's been ten minutes since he was informed that it was approaching! What is taking him so long?!"

-x-

Shado had to admit to her father that she didn't like the outfit that seemed similar to the one they saw the girl with the blue hair in. It looked like a diving suit, but it didn't cover his head, and the blue, black and white portions made him look silly. And then, there were those white things that stuck out on his head.

As they were in the hall, the girl had expressed another concern for her father: While these people put him in a bad situation, the girl told him that they didn't even know what these giant monsters were capable of until after they sent him out to face them. And even if they sent him out to face this new one, they wouldn't know what it was capable of until after it did something, not before.

" _They can't do something to find out what it can do instead of making you go out there?"_ Shinji recalled his daughter asking him as he continued to watch her sit on the bench in front of him in the hall. _"They just made you go against the first two without a warning, Daddy. They should know better by now."_

"Shinji!" They both heard Misato yell at the teen boy. "What are you doing?! The Angel's getting closer to the city, and you're wasting time out here!"

Shinji looked at her, but then returned his gaze to his daughter.

"I have to consider what my daughter told me just recently today," he told Misato.

"What are you talking about?" She questioned.

"You don't know what these Angels are capable of, so you need to find out before I go out and do something about it."

"Shinji, we don't have time for this."

"You have time to send out a decoy before you think to send me out. You may not know it or care much for it, but I'm not some expendable soldier that jumps for you whenever you call for me. Send out a decoy…or the blue-haired girl, even. Find out what this thing can do before I go out to face it. Know your enemy."

Misato wanted to repeat that they didn't have time for this, but then recalled his actions against the Fourth Angel in the last attack…and really didn't want to see what she had glimpsed before. And she knew this boy was stressed enough as it was already, having to put up with the agency, his estranged father and taking care of his illegitimate little girl.

"Just make sure to be in the Eva when it becomes necessary," she told him, and left them alone.

Shado clapped her hands for her father; he had stood up to someone older than him again.

-x-

"… I don't believe we're doing this," went Ritsuko to Misato, just as the technicians sent up a giant, balloon version of Evangelion Unit-00 holding a rifle. "And the boy actually spoke of this?"

"It was actually his daughter that shared her concerns about her father's safety," Misato responded. "He just backed up and enforced her concerns for her father. And they were both right, we don't know what these Angels can do."

With the Eva balloon fully inflated and being transported out of the base, some of the technicians were starting to spread rumors that this attempt to see what the Angel could do was because of the Third Child's daughter. They found it unusual to be trying something like this because of a little girl's concern for her teen father.

"…Still, relatives of Commander Ikari," a man said to another man as they were moving the balloon up the shaft. "Hard to imagine the guy actually caring about his son and granddaughter."

"…So the girl shows that she loves her father and doesn't want him throwing his life away," a female technician said to a male technician.

"But the Third Child doesn't seem to care much at all about any of us," the guy responded.

"…We're secondary concerns to the boy. He cares more for his daughter than anyone else."

"…A child of rape and a child whose father walked out on him years ago before he was raped. It's a saddening picture."

"I want to pity the boy and his daughter," another woman expressed, "but I can't see past the fact that they're related to Commander Ikari."

-x-

"…He actually suggested this?" Gendo questioned Misato as the Eva dummy floated in the air in front of the Angel.

"It was his daughter, actually," she explained, and then watched on the holographic screens as the balloon, armed with a balloon version of a rifle, was made to look like it was about to assault the Angel…and the Angel unleashed a blast of energy that obliterated the balloon.

"Jeez…" Hyuga sighed in defeat.

"Next," Misato ordered.

From afar on a hillside, a large, tank-like train cart was pulled out of a nearby tunnel and fired a rocket at the Angel. The rocket hit the Angel, but it still stood where it floated. A small flash of light emitted from the Angel…and the machine (along with much of the hillside) was eradicated.

"Maybe it was a good idea to use decoys instead of the Third Child," Shigeru expressed.

"Based on the data collected from both attempts," went Hyuga, "this Angel automatically attacks anything that comes within a certain radius of it, and reacts with hostility the instant it is made aware of the enemy's intentions."

"Meaning that if we were try to attack this Angel with rockets, bombs or tanks, we'd be the ones sent into the next world instead of the Angel."

"What about its AT-Field?" Misato asked.

"It's still active. It doesn't seem like this Angel's going to drop it anytime soon." Shigeru answered.

"Offensively, defensively, no matter how you put it, this Angel's like a flying fortress."

And it was only because of this discovery brought upon by the thoughtful suggestion of a little girl enforced by the dangerous situation her father was involved in that they knew better now. And it was also because of this new discovery that they couldn't send an Eva out against it without unintentionally having the pilot killed before they even had an open opportunity to attack.

"So how are we supposed to fight an enemy we can't even get near?" Ritsuko asked.

-x-

Shinji went to the Eva cages, but he still didn't get inside Unit-01. He just stood in front of the purple behemoth that he hated as much as he hated his father, waiting for the call to actual action.

"Shinji," he turned to face Misato on his right, giving her a frown. "Thanks to your daughter's concern for your well-being, we have to try a different approach with the Angel."

"Really?" He questioned.

"If I wasn't so angry with the both of you, I'd send you out there right now, regardless of the danger."

"You know, you might be my commanding officer, but if you so much as tried to lay a hand on Shado, you would be just like any other woman I've met. You would be a stranger that I would have to use violence on if she were harmed. So try and send me out there right now, regardless of the danger, and try to explain it to my daughter why there's a chance her father won't be coming home."

It was actually quite a good threat Shinji uttered to her. Misato found herself unable to talk back for his choice of words.

"We'll be using a sniper assault on the Angel," she told him instead.

-x-

A sniper attack was the best chance they had with this Angel, but their prototype of a positron rifle was unfinished, so NERV had to borrow the necessary parts for a functional version that could be setup in the time remaining before the Angel completed its direct invasion into the Geo-Front. Unfortunately, Misato and Ritsuko, who were present when visiting the JSSDF's research and development facility, had to contend with some of the men present there that were displeased with the paramilitary agency due to a rumor they had heard that wasn't so much of a rumor as it was the truth.

"…It's cruel, what you're doing to those two," one of the two men in front of them expressed his opinion. "Bad enough you exploit a former kidnap victim, but one whose priorities should be his kid that nobody else would take of, that's crossing several lines that you can only hope that the gods will have pity upon you."

"Maybe, but we didn't have any choice in the matter," Misato told him, finishing signing the papers that would permit NERV to borrow the necessary parts from their facility.

"How do you people sleep at night?" The other man questioned. "How does that boy and his little girl sleep at night?"

Neither Misato nor Ritsuko answered that question. How could they? Hardly a person in NERV really spoke with Shinji or Shado beyond the relative business they did. Even Misato's conversations with Shinji were pretty one-sided; he didn't really seem interested in talking to her more than what she felt was necessary. For all she knew, the two slept as peacefully as they could.

"Also, based on what you said about this Angel's AT-Field, you'll require a major amount of electrical energy just to pierce through it," the first guy said to them. "Just where do you plan on getting that much electricity?"

"Where do you think? From allover Japan." Misato told them.

-x-

Shado didn't like the odd looks her father got in the cafeteria. The people always seemed to have a problem with him, just because of her presence. It wasn't really the first time she even noticed this, either; this had gone on since before they even arrived to Tokyo-3, back when they lived with her father's aunt and uncle and cousin, people that just seemed to hate them for no other reason than for who her father and his father were. And she still couldn't forget that one time with her father's aunt in the kitchen…or what she had asked her to do that scared her.

Shinji noticed her concern and tried to remedy the scene.

"I think you have something on your nose, Shado," he told her.

Shado wiped her nose clean with her left hand and asked if it was fine now.

"Now, it's on your forehead," he told her, chuckling.

"What?" She responded, and then realized the truth. "Hey! That's not funny."

"I wasn't laughing."

She giggled and instantly forgot about the other people around them.

Some of them, however, saw the girl as a part of NERV that simply didn't belong because she brought an element that didn't go together with what they did here. But the same could've also applied to the Third Child, and it wasn't the fact that he was Commander Ikari's son. It was something else that made it seem like they just didn't belong.

-x-

"…If anything, Ikari," went Fuyutsuki to Gendo in the latter's office, "the girl is smart enough to know when her father is in danger against an enemy we know nothing about and just wants to see him come out of it in one piece."

"Her very presence could interfere with everything," Gendo suspected; he just didn't like the Third Child having any emotional attachments that interfered with his sense of priorities when it came to the paramilitary agency, and this girl was a rogue element that he felt threatened by because the boy demonstrated very little to almost no attachment to Unit-01.

"Still, it's only because of her involvement in his time here that we even have your son here at all," Fuyutsuki reminded him; if anything happened to the girl that excited the Third Child's negativity, not only would they be short a pilot, but he would hold them responsible for whatever led to her harm. "While his sense of priorities may differ from what you had intended, at least he is cooperating to a degree that helps NERV."

On the computer screen on Gendo's desk, the progress the Angel made with a drill it possessed was hindered by the layers of dense armor meant to shield NERV HQ from external attack. It would be less than eight more hours before all twenty-two layers of armor were penetrated.

"Maybe his daughter is a wild card," Fuyutsuki continued, "but should anything happen to her, we can kiss the pilot's feet goodbye."

-x-

Shado tensed up, and Shinji, who was carrying her on his back, felt her tiny hands tighten their weak grip on his shoulders as he walked down the hall to the outside of NERV HQ. Her father turned around, and they saw the blue-haired girl, Rei Ayanami, standing there in the hall in front of them, looking at them with her left eye (as her right eye still had a bandage over it).

Shinji felt his daughter tense up again, and he turned back to walk down the hall.

"Daddy, I didn't like the way she was looking at us," Shado told him.

"Same here, sweetie," he responded, turning a corner, but poked his head back to see if the blue-haired girl was still there…and she was. _How many weirdos do they have here?_

As they stepped outside into the Geo-Front beyond the base, the First Child silently followed them, causing Shado to be tense all the time for some reason.

That was, at least, until Shinji turned to see the albino a good distance from the two.

"Is she making you feel tense, Shado?" He asked his daughter.

"Yes, Daddy," she answered. "Is she following us?"

"Wait by the trees over there (he pointed her to three trees nearby the large, artificial lake), and I'll go see if she is."

She ran over to the trees while he walked over to the girl.

"I don't know if you were ordered to follow us or if you're just a curious person, and I honestly don't care," he told Rei, "but you're bothering my daughter, and that means you're bothering me, as well. Don't take it too personal, but what the Hell do you want?"

"It should be against NERV rules and regulations to have a little child here," Rei said, as if to irritate him over such minor concerns. "Why is she here with you?"

"I don't see how that is any of your business. Why she's with me is nobody's business but mine."

"Is she really your child?"

"Watch it, lady."

"Will she be with you in the next sortie?"

Shinji's right fist balled up with hostility.

"You wanna get a black eye to go with that bandage?!" He threatened her. "Back the Hell away! You understand that? Back the Hell away."

He turned to leave, but stopped…and turned to face her again.

"I see you anywhere near Shado…and I won't hesitate to make sure you never show your face anywhere without a bruise or scar," he threatened her again, and turned to go to his daughter.

Shado poked her head out from behind the tree nearest to the lake, seeing her father coming over.

"Why was she here?" She asked him.

"Trying to make something out of nothing," he explained, calming down now.

"I don't like her, Daddy."

"Neither do I, Shado."

-x-

"Well… I think it's safe to say that the young parent and child don't like the First Child," went Maya to Ritsuko, watching the scene through the surveillance cameras outside the base.

"And the boy threatened to harm her if she ever got near his daughter," the faux-blond expressed. "We may need to recommend that the girl be removed from his care."

"Do you really want to risk the emotional welfare of the two? The boy's protective of his daughter, and the girl loves her father. Separating them could be a risk it is simply too much for us to take at a time like this."

-x-

Shado hadn't seen a beach with her father, but this large, artificial lake was an adequate substitute for the time being. This allowed them to skip some stones that were there. She wasn't good at it, but that was because she was still little, and her father wasn't good at it, either, due to never being taught by anyone and having watched it being done on television. Still, it allowed her to spend time with her father, to not be ignored or disregarded.

"We're just throwing rocks into the water," she told him.

"Must it really matter, dear?" Shinji asked her, tossing a stone as hard as he could into the water.

"I don't think that was very far."

"I'd like to see you try better."

Shado threw her stone as hard and as fast as possible, but didn't get very far. Actually, she threw the stone in front of their feet, splashing water at them.

"Well," went Shinji, not even the slightest bit disappointed in Shado, "you did try. Good attempt."

"Thank you, Daddy!"

-x-

"…How can he be playing with her at a time like this?" Misato asked Ritsuko, having come to Central Dogma to find the Third Child.

"Blame his sense of priorities," the faux-blond suggested.

-x-

As the night took over the city, Shinji placed his daughter in the locker room and instructed her to wait there for him until he came back for her.

"You promise you'll come back?" She asked him, standing behind the row of lockers as he changed back into the plugsuit.

"Not even this large creature will keep me away from the most important person in my life," Shinji told her, sealing his plugsuit.

"You're the greatest, Daddy."

Standing up off the bench, Shinji chuckled a little; his daughter remained the only person that could put a smile on his face.

Once he left the bag of sandwiches and juice boxes with her, Shado was as prepped as possible for the remainder of the situation until her father came back.

-x-

Shinji ignored Rei's presence during the entire briefing by Misato and Ritsuko. They all knew well enough that he didn't like her and didn't try to raise the issue. Since Unit-01 was their only working Evangelion, Shinji had to face the Angel on his own, just like the first two Angels. He tried to comprehend as much of the information he received during the briefing, though only a small measure of the details were understood: Unit-01 was to snipe the Angel from a relative distance with a sniper rifle that fired something called positrons, would be drawing upon the entire nation's electrical power grid to pierce the Angel's AT-Field, and the usual pressure of how all of mankind's future was on his shoulders to deal with the threat.

In all honesty, Shinji didn't concern himself with all of mankind in any situation. How could he? If he had to give mankind a face, to give the people all around the planet (or what remained of a planet that was covered mostly in water and mountainous land after a fifteen-year-old catastrophe), it would have to be the face of Shado, the very person he would put his life on the line for. For her, he would deal with this threat he didn't care for, putting up with these people he didn't trust worth a damn. For her…and nothing and no one else.

"Are you ready?" Misato asked him.

"Let's get this over with," he responded.

-x-

"Based on what we could see from the security cameras," a man in a black suit informed Gendo in his office, showing some pictures on the hallway outside the locker room assigned to the Third Child, "he took his daughter into the room with him…but he was the only one that came out."

"So he just left her in there?" Fuyutsuki asked the man.

"I already have three men down there to see if she's there," he explained.

-x-

At first, Shado thought it was her father that had returned, but when she saw that it was just a man in a suit, she returned her attention to her coloring book on the bench.

"What are you doing here, girl?" The man asked her, but she chose not to answer him. "Excuse me, I'm talking to you. What are you doing here?"

She looked up at him, seeing two more men in suits behind him, and responded, "I'm waiting for my daddy to come back. Now, please, go away."

-x-

"…Now, please, go away." They heard Shado's voice over the radio in Gendo's office.

"What do you see in there?" The man asked over the radio.

"Just a bag of sandwiches and juice boxes that the Third Child must've left," the man on the other end informed them.

"He left her in the one place he would come back for her," Fuyutsuki stated; he could understand how devoted the boy was to his child and made sure she had food until he came back for her. "He was just taking steps to ensure she was kept out of harm's way."

-x-

"…You don't seem to speak much with anyone except your daughter, don't you?" Misato asked Shinji, as he leaned against the security railing beside Unit-01, staring off at the dark city long after its power had been shut off to deal with the Angel, bathed only in the moonlight and stars.

He didn't answer her.

"You know, you can talk about anything to anyone," she suggested.

"I don't know you," he then spoke up. "I don't really want to get to know you. My relationship with my daughter is nobody's business. I trust my daughter. I don't trust any of you."

He didn't see himself as being cold, but just direct in his defense to not want to have any relationships with any of the NERV personnel beyond what he did for them. Ever since he found his daughter had been ignored for an entire day by his aunt when he went to school (or rather, he was forced to go back after insisting that he take care of his daughter), he lost a lot more of his faith in adults (his belief in adults being good people had been shattered since before he was kidnapped and raped). If anyone was going to look after Shado, it had to be himself, and that meant keeping others at a distance; even the touch of another that wasn't his daughter was a hindrance and irritation to him.

Misato decided not to start with him and backed away. The boy was damaged beyond a doubt and wasn't going to trust any of them any time soon.

 _Something clearly happened to him, and I bet it was more than just being kidnapped and raped,_ she thought, wondering if she needed to do a thorough background check on the boy that clearly cared more for his kid than anyone else.

-x-

Looking at the Angel through the sniping system, Shinji saw the Angel. But then, without even wanting to, his perception of the Angel shifted into something he didn't want to see. In place of the Angel was his rapist, who was trying to reach out to him with her left hand.

 _Get a grip, Shinji,_ he thought, trying to clear his mind of his darkest memories. _She's dead. She can't hurt you any more than she had all those years ago._

He tried to put the woman out of his mind, but when he did, her image was replaced with that of his father with a cruel expression. No matter which way he thought, he had two bad thoughts that wouldn't leave his mind. One of a woman that robbed him of his innocence…and the other of a man that never once said a kind word to him, never told him that he mattered to him as a person, as family, or even apologized for abandoning him. They were both just bad people that showed him how cruel and cold the world was to most people.

" _You're the greatest, Daddy!"_ He heard his daughter's voice cut through the illusion of both adults as an illusion of her dispelled theirs. _"You're the greatest!"_

 _There have been many times where I am sure that I am nothing more than a mistake nobody wanted to correct long ago,_ he thought, _but out of all the things I've ever done with my fourteen years of life…my daughter, my Shado…is the one, good thing…that ever gave me a sense of worth, of value, of something or someone to live for that gave me the time of day. I would die for her._

He breathed and blinked, seeing the Angel that put his child in danger of living her final moments out his sight…or being alone for the rest of her life with nobody to care about her. He didn't even hear Misato order him to shoot the Angel; he blocked out the voices and thought only of a memory that smeared the sense of solitude he didn't enjoy.

How many fathers thought about the first word of their kids spoke out?

-x-

She felt a small rattle of the walls and floor, but Shado merely closed her eyes and thought of her father, her family. With him, there was very little fear of the unknown in the world, no reason to believe that people that thought she was better off without him because of something they called his age, or even the shame some say she represented just by existing. She never understood why they were both looked down upon, but Shado understood that her father wasn't liked by others most of the time…and he never did anything wrong to anyone short of threatening to hurt them if they hurt her.

"Oh," the suits that wouldn't leave her alone gasped slightly, grabbing onto the lockers to avoid falling.

-x-

All he saw in the last second was a large, blue diamond with a large hole that gave the impression that it was bleeding. Shinji never felt the blast the Angel unleashed. All he could think about was seeing his daughter when this was over…and now he could.

"…Shinji…" He heard Misato's voice over the intercom.

"Are we through here?" He asked her. "This thing looks dead now."

One shot was all it took, all he needed.

"Yeah, Shinji," she answered him. "You did it."

But the Angel's defeat didn't matter to him. It did matter, but it didn't matter on a personal or emotional level. To him, it was just another matter that needed to be resolved and forgotten about later.

"Shado," he sighed.

-x-

"…There was really nothing," Maya explained to Misato, going over Shinji's synchronization with Unit-01. "His synchronization was elevated, but, emotionally, it was like he wasn't there. There was no feeling of anger, except towards his father and his rapist. No degree of hostility towards the Angel, no desire to commit any level of violence. No emotion, whatsoever."

On a monitor, looking through a security camera that looked down at the hallway outside the men's locker room, Misato, Ritsuko, Maya, Aoba and Makoto saw Shado waiting outside for her father, who soon stepped out and picked her up off the bench.

"I'd call this one damaged kid," Aoba expressed, seeing no comparison between the pressured pilot and the young father walking out with his daughter. "He feels nothing for the Angels, hates his father and his rapist, doesn't get along well with adults, but does everything he does for his little girl."

"Nothing else matters to him beyond the girl," Makoto expressed. "She's his anchor, the only clarity in what little sanity that exists in this world for him."

"He'd do anything for her sake," Maya added in.

-x-

Removing his shirt and discarding it into the hamper, Shinji examined his torso for the umpteenth time. Even after almost five years, the large, star-shaped, bruise-like scar he received from his kidnapping and rape never healed completely; he remembered how the woman and her brother held him down…and the other man took a hot blade and slowly carved into his skin. There were times where he couldn't compare any recent pains from the agony during the time he was kidnapped. And it was all the woman's idea to give him this scar as a reminder of their time together, like it was some sort of twisted date. And this was how people treated each other on real dates, Shinji felt there was no need to date anyone if they just wanted to hurt you like this.

 _And all the doctors did was just wrap me in bandages,_ he thought, putting on a new shirt to covered all but the top of the scar that reached the base of his neck.

Knock-knock. He heard a small knock on the bathroom door.

"Daddy? Are you alright in there?"

"I'm fine, sweetheart," he answered her, and slid the door open.

Shado was the only other person in the city that knew of her father's injury from before her time; not only had she seen it a while back, but the aunt and uncle said it was her fault that a woman she never knew caused the injury. But her father declared that she wasn't at fault for something her mother had done to him.

"Were you scared of the monster, Daddy?" She asked him.

"Not as much as I was of leaving you," he answered again.

Much later, in the dark of his room, Shinji, still awake, looked up at his ceiling, wanting to forget about most of what happened earlier in the day. The Angel, the Eva, Rei Ayanami, most of everything.

 _Sometimes,_ he thought, _just sometimes_ _…_ _I hate not crying about things._

To be continued…

A/N: So how damaged do you think Shinji is to have his daughter be his anchor to tie him to what little sanity he has left in his life?


	5. Devoted

Creation began on 07-13-16

Creation ended on 07-24-16

Neon Genesis Evangelion

Different from You: Devoted

 _He doesn't attend school, he hasn't been to NERV,_ thought Misato as she stood in front of the door to the apartment Shinji and Shado were assigned to for the duration of their time here in Tokyo-3. _Nobody hears from him or his daughter, and suddenly, it's my job to know why?_

She knocked on the door and waited for a response since she didn't have a key; it seemed that Shinji had trust issues with adults that were beyond severe.

Suddenly, the door opened and she saw Shinji, who appeared preoccupied with something else that he didn't even remove the chain on the door.

"Yes?" He asked her.

"You haven't been to NERV in three days," she explained.

"And that's a problem?" He questioned; in addition to the apartment, he got a cell phone that acted up in case of an emergency that required him, and so far, it hasn't rung to indicate that he was required at NERV. "There hasn't been another attack since that day."

"Well, no, but you're still required for synchronization testing," she reminded him.

"That's going to have to wait a while," he declared. "I have other priorities I must attend to."

"Like what, exactly?" She tried to joke around. "What, your daughter's sick with the stomach flu or something like that? Heh-heh."

Shinji's expression was deadpanned as he responded, "Yeah. Exactly like that. I have to go now."

Even though he didn't slam the door close in front of her, Misato still flinched. Now, she knew that half-serious jokes weren't going to get her into his good graces.

"Okay," she sighed and walked away.

-x-

"Urgh!" Shado groaned as she threw up in the toilet again, supported by her father.

She felt fine the night they went home after the Fifth Angel was dealt with, but the next morning, she didn't feel well at all. At first, it was just a feeling of fatigue, but then she developed a fever, and finally needed to throw up every now and then because she couldn't keep anything down.

"Phht!" She spat out the rest of her small breakfast, which consisted of just toast and miso soup.

Shinji then carried her over to the sink and helped her wash out the rest of the bile. While her fever had gone down some, he decided that if this vomiting persisted tomorrow, he would have to take her to see a doctor because he was concerned for her well-being.

"Phht!" She spat the water-mixed bile leftover in her mouth into the sink. "Who was at the door?"

"Just a stranger," he explained to her, and carried her back to her room. "I'd better take your temperature again."

"Okay," she agreed with him, and opened her mouth so that he could place the thermometer under her tongue to get her exact temperature.

He then looked out the window and wondered if anyone was watching them. He wouldn't have put it past people like the ones at NERV to spy on him and Shado, like they needed to be watched all the time, but to have no privacy was to cross a severe line. Then again, he didn't trust them and had no reason to start trusting them.

Beep. The thermometer went, snapping him back to his daughter's side.

"How is it?" She asked him as he checked it.

"Not as bad as yesterday, but still very high," he told her. "If your vomiting persists tomorrow, we're going to see a doctor, okay?"

"Okay."

He gathered her bowl and saucer and stepped out of the room to take them to the kitchen.

-x-

"…You think his daughter's sick, and that's why he hasn't left his unit?" Ritsuko asked Misato, who informed her of her visit to see Shinji and Shado.

"I joked about that a little, but he seemed to take it personal before he shut the door in my face," she explained to her.

"Well, while you were out making jokes about a sick child, I dug a little deeper into the Third Child's medical background and found something that may have been a deeper factor into his trust issues and severe social skills." Ritsuko informed her, handing a folder with photos. "These were taken by the medical staff here when they changed him out of his LCL-soaked clothes. The men that changed him while he was unconscious didn't want to go anywhere near him after that."

Misato looked at the pictures and was taken aback by the sight of the boy's chest.

"My God," she gasped.

"Getting his medical records from the previous hospital, I found out that he got that massive scar from his kidnappers," Ritsuko revealed to her. "It was his rapist's idea to do this to him."

Misato couldn't look at the injury any longer and put the picture away. It seemed like a worse version of her own scar from Second Impact, only hers was because of a shrapnel injury, not because of a depraved bunch of minds that wanted to torture people.

-x-

Shado, who had fallen asleep after her father left out of her room, awoke sometime later and looked over to her left of her futon, seeing her father asleep by her side; his constant vigilance over her had clearly cost him some resting time.

"Daddy?" She called out to him, her voice weak.

Shinji stirred from his undesired slumber and shook his head to clear his drowsiness.

"Uh, yeah, Shado?" He responded.

"I need to go to the bathroom," she told him, and he helped her out of her futon, carrying her back to the bathroom.

However, before Shinji could set her down, she puked over his right shoulder and onto the floor.

"Well, that was unexpected," he uttered, keeping his emotional responses in check around Shado.

"Sorry, Daddy," she apologized to him.

"It's okay, sweetie," he assured her; he knew she didn't do it on purpose. "Accidents happen. Come on. Let's get you seated onto the toilet."

As she sat down and relieved herself, her father changed out of his shirt and put on a new one.

"How long was I asleep?" She asked him.

"Almost four hours," he answered, and then got a whiff of something that wasn't his daughter's vomit.

"Oops," she realized.

"It's okay, sweetie."

-x-

Fuyutsuki was shown the pictures of the scarring on Shinji's chest that was confirmed to have occurred prior to his rape, and found himself unable to keep from retching.

"This is insane," he expressed to Misato and Ritsuko. "What sort of mind does this to a young child?"

"A depraved one, that's what," answered Misato to him. "The doctors couldn't even use skin grafts to cover up half the injury."

"It's clear that this is another factor of his kidnapping that he never recovered from," Ritsuko explained.

"And you think this contributes to his inability to trust people?" Fuyutsuki asked them.

"As his daughter's the only person he does trust," went Ritsuko, "his kidnapping, subsequent rape, lack of therapy and neglect have all contributed to his trust issues. Anyone older than him is someone he views not only as a stranger, but as someone he shouldn't bother with getting to know. If there are any other factors that contribute to this, either we don't know them or the Third Child hasn't shared them with us."

"Has anyone been by his apartment to see him?"

"Only Captain Katsuragi has been over there, but her presence wasn't welcomed by him."

"If his daughter is sick, he'll ignore everything and everyone around here until she's well, but I don't believe he let any physician look at her unless he's around." Misato expressed her opinion.

That's when Fuyutsuki realized something else: There had been no word of any contact from the Third Child's aunt and uncle.

"Has there been any word from the aunt or uncle?" He asked them.

"No, sir," Ritsuko answered.

-x-

So far, her temperature had dropped back down to the normal standards, but vomiting and diarrhea hadn't stopped yet. But she was recovering from her illness. If she needed a few more days, then Shinji couldn't argue with that. He had read on how most parents (real ones, that is) put their children before anything else, in sickness or health. As she slept again through the afternoon, Shinji watched her; the afternoon radio babel and weather reports didn't mean much to him, not even the American dramas that he discovered in the last two years.

Beep. His NERV-issued phone beeped, indicating a text message had been received from someone that had his contact number.

He picked it up and tapped on the touchscreen to read the text. It read, _"NERV HQ: We need you down here for testing."_ But he texted back, _"Your tests can wait until Shado is well."_ And then he put the phone down to resume watching his daughter as she slept peacefully.

Beep. The phone displayed another text message.

" _NERV HQ: We need you to be ready in case of the next Angel attack."_

"Unh…" He heard his daughter mumble in her sleep as she turned to face away from him.

Frowning, he texted back, _"I'm not the only soldier you have at your disposal! Use the albino girl! My daughter takes priority before NERV and the Angels!"_ Then, he turned his phone off.

 _You come first, Shado,_ he thought. _With me, you always come first._

-x-

"…Who does he think he is?" Ritsuko questioned, unable to send a new text to the Third Child after he sent his last message that told them to use the First Child and how his little girl's care took priority over his obligation to NERV against the Angels.

"Well, it's not like we can make him choose what will be his priorities and what won't be," said Misato to her, "no matter how much we want him to see things from a different perspective."

"You sound as though you're afraid of him."

Misato wouldn't confirm or deny that. As far as she cared to admit, this fatherly Shinji Ikari was not someone to be taken lightly or cross. The lack of trust with others, the scars from his abuse, his detachment from the majority of his family and his heavy concerns towards his daughter. Yes, she viewed this young man as a person not to be taken lightly.

"We really should try to get in contact with his aunt and uncle," she decided upon the Sub-Commander's suggestion, "and Rei can be tested further until Unit-00 is repaired."

-x-

Gendo could've had a complaint made about the Third Child's lack of obligation to NERV, even try to have his daughter removed from his custody, but was persuaded by Fuyutsuki not to trouble the boy because the little girl was sick and needed him until she was well. It made him disgusted by the boy's devotion to a bastard child that he himself wanted nothing to do with, regardless of her biological ties to the boy. The situation was made worse by the fact that the Third Child wasn't developing any degree of attachment with the Eva; his synchronization was within acceptability, but he wasn't letting himself get invested in the purple behemoth.

 _If he's not getting attached to the Eva, his usefulness is in question,_ he thought, looking at the synchronization graphs belonging to the boy. _His attachment to the little girl may jeopardize my scenario if he doesn't let go of her._

-x-

"Hmm…" Shado mumbled as she awoke to the setting sunlight. "Daddy?"

Shinji, who was in the hallway outside of her room, came in with a cup of tea in his right hand.

"Right here, Shado," he told her, sitting down beside her futon. "How are you feeling?"

"A little better, actually," she responded, and was handed over the cup of lukewarm tea. "Mm."

After she drank from the cup slowly, revitalizing her dehydrated throat, she gave him back the cup.

"How long was I asleep this time?" She asked him.

"Too long," he simplified his answer to her. "But too much sleep is better than no sleep."

He placed his left hand on her forehead and felt her temperature.

"Am I well enough to eat again, Daddy?" She asked him.

"I'd say that you're well enough for curry, sweetie," he answered her, feeling her temperature was normal and hoped that her stomach was okay to allow curry.

Ding! He head the doorbell ring, and sighed in frustration as he got up to answer the door.

Against her better judgment, Shado got up and followed him from a distance and watched him open the door to see whoever it was that was there. Even though she was too far away to see them, she couldn't forget the minor dullness of glasses with an orange tint to them…or the cold look on the man's face. She didn't like her father's father, and quickly hid behind a corner wall.

"What are you doing here and what do you want?" She heard Shinji ask him.

"You have been absent from NERV for almost a week," she heard the older man say to him. "Your lack of attendance will have repercussions we cannot tolerate."

"And earlier, that lady, Katsuragi, said differently," Shinji told him, leaving no hint of disgust in his voice towards him. "You can say what you want, but my priorities are as I see them. NERV, and by extension, you of all people, are a secondary concern to me. My daughter is my primary concern, and she's recovering from a flu."

Shado just wanted to hear the front door shut and her father walk away to say that the glasses-wearing man had left.

"If this persists, certain actions must be employed," she heard the man say to her father.

"You wanna see certain actions employed, go talk to your in-laws," her father told him. "You have your way of dealing with what you perceive to be problems, and I have my way of dealing with what I perceive to be problems…and that includes people like you."

The sound of the door closed and since she couldn't hear the sound of a chain being replaced, Shado guessed that her father never took the chain off. She sighed and waited for her father to come get her…after he had calmed down because after something like this, he really needed to; people that got on her father's nerves made him difficult to get near until after he took a few minutes to relax…and sometimes, his chest scar started to act up.

"Shado?" She heard him call her.

She stuck out her head to see him, seeing him against the wall on the floor, his right hand clutching his shirt tightly.

"Are you alright, Daddy?" She asked him.

"Yeah. Just give me a few minutes, dear."

She slowly came over and sat beside him.

-x-

"…What were you thinking, Ikari?" Fuyutsuki questioned Gendo when he found out he had gone over to the Third Child's apartment. "Were you deliberately trying to put stress on him?"

"He's clearly a damaged brat," Gendo expressed

"Which we will send to an early grave and leave his daughter without anyone she knows and trusts if we persist in disturbing him," Fuyutsuki declared.

-x-

She only had one bowl, but Shado had enough curry in her stomach.

"Thank you, Daddy," she praised her father, and vacated the table to go to the bathroom.

As she brushed her teeth, Shinji put their bowls in the sink and placed the leftover curry in the refrigerator for later.

"Phht!" He heard Shado spit into the sink. "Daddy, we're out of toothpaste!"

"I know, Shado," he told her, chuckling.

-x-

"…He blew me off," went Misato to Ritsuko that evening in the latter's office, slumping into a chair. "He wouldn't even spend a minute to speak about Shinji."

"Well, if we can't find out what happened to the Third Child and his daughter from the relatives, we may as well find out from their files." Ritsuko expressed.

"Except the files don't reveal everything."

"But what choice do we have?"

"We could subpoena them…and force them to tell us everything they know."

"Why not ask the Third Child directly? He could know what we need to know."

"Trust me, he isn't very social towards most people. I won't even risk my neck trying to compare him to Commander Ikari; even if there's one crucial fact that separates them from one another, and that's the boy's commitment to his daughter."

"You do realize that even if the girl hadn't suggested anything and the boy still refused to pilot the Eva, we could've had a worse incident with the Fifth Angel. She could've gotten sick during that time and the boy would've put everything on hold until she recovered."

"He's a parent first and a pilot second to last, Rits. He's a person first and a soldier second to last, too."

"Both of whom are very defiant…and willful."

-x-

"…Well, Daddy?" Shado asked her father the next morning, as he finished checking her temperature. "Am I no longer ill?"

Setiing the thermometer down, he answered, "Your temperature's back to normal. You've stopped vomiting and your diarrhea's cleared up. I'd say you're well enough to go outside today."

"Must you go to that place today?"

"After having you spent four days inside to recover from your sickness, I'd rather have you go to the park after we go shopping for necessities."

"Great!"

Shinji smiled as he got up and left her room to give her privacy to change. Yes, he would've put his obligation to NERV on hold just to help her recover some more or just to have a life free of woe.

To be continued…

A/N: Would any of you put everything on hold to take care of someone you love?


	6. Scars that run deeper than deep

Creation began on 07-26-16

Creation ended on 08-24-16

Neon Genesis Evangelion

Different from You: Scars that run deeper than deep

Sometimes, Shinji considered the world of alcoholism, just to see what a can of beer would taste like. But then, he'd be setting a terrible example for his daughter. He didn't even touch a drop of wine because he had read what any form of liquor could do to one's way of thinking. A sober mind, clear of any thoughts, unintended or depraved, was a mind set in steel that couldn't be remade.

So he stuck with tea…and its many varieties. Ginseng, ginger and jasmine were among his choice of tastes. They had the effect of calming his mind when people he didn't like or trust caused him undue stress; this was often from people like his father and the in-laws.

"Daddy?" He heard his daughter's voice, and was reminded that he was inside a tea shop with Shado in Tokyo-3; it had been blind luck that he just saw the small shop and saw that they had a variety of flavors to choose from.

"Yes, sweetie?" He asked her, looking at her cup of ginseng tea.

"You seemed absent-minded," she told him. "Are you alright?"

"I'm fine," he assured her, and finished his cup of jasmine tea.

-x-

"…What's this right here?" Misato asked Ritsuko, noticing a folder on the desk in the latter's office. "Another load of information about the Third Child?"

"Actually, it's about his daughter," the faux-blond explained as the purple-haired woman picked the folder up and looked at the pictures taken of the girl. "Commander Ikari requested that he'd be updated about the Third Child's child."

"Rits, it's only been two days since we learned that the girl really was sick with the flu. Shinji really was taking care of her during the whole time. He definitely prefers her company over anyone else's."

"Unfortunately, this behavior can hinder his service."

"Personally, I think the person that may hinder him the most is his father. Those two certainly don't… Who is this?"

"Who is what?" Ritsuko asked her.

"This girl with Shinji at the park," Misato answered her, showing her a picture of a teenage girl around the boy's age, looking as though they were engaged in conversation.

"I'm still using the MAGI to find out who she is," Ritsuko explained. "She seems to be someone the boy appears to take to."

But when Misato flipped the photo over to look at the next picture that was a clear violation of the boy and his daughter's rights to privacy, she had a feeling that there was something more…when she saw Shado in a swing set with a boy around her age…and Shinji and the teen girl were with them.

-x-

They went to the pack again the next day after Shinji was through with synchronization testing. And they saw them there again. It was the first time in a long time that Shado had someone her own age to play with that wasn't afraid of her or looked down upon her…and it was the first time in a long time that her father had someone he could relate to that was of the same or similar boat of trauma and disgrace as he was.

"We should make this a habit of ours that we see each other around here," the teenage girl said to Shinji, as they leaned against a small fence as the two children ran around the jungle gym.

"It's been, what, about a year-and-a-half since you two up and left?" Shinji asked her.

"Close to it," she answered. "It wasn't easy for either of us, but I couldn't take it, anymore. I couldn't take her abuse, her put-downs. Even when she knew it was their fault, she continued to blame me. I knew it was only a matter of time before she decided to…put an end to it all."

Shinji looked away from her and at the boy running up to the slide in front of his daughter.

"You really think she would've done that to you?" He asked her.

"If I wasn't reported missing or kidnapped along with Toya, then she clearly wasn't concerned with our absence. I had to do what I had to do for the both of us, even if it meant leaving a young man I dared to call a friend."

"Truth be told, I had forgotten about you. Shado wondered why you both just up and left. I found it hard just to make up a reason for why good people leave. Because you are good people. Why do good people leave? Because of problems from where they live? Because of people they can no longer tolerate, but can't deal with legally? Because of fear? Or all of the above? There are many reasons why good people leave, whatever they are, and they're likely to be understandable than any excuse a bad person gives for why they leave."

The girl looked at him, and then looked at the boy, at Toya, despite many features he had that she didn't care for, but cared about him because he was hers.

"So…what brought you here to Tokyo-3?" She asked Shinji.

"Family that isn't family…and may never be family, ever again," he spoke in riddles. "Why are you here when it's nothing more than a pit of shallow graves?"

"I almost ended up doing something that was just as worse as what people that used to be my family did to me…until I met up with an elderly man that took pity upon Toya and I. The tea house we were in when you came, he owns and runs it. I help around the shop for four hours a day for four days a week. I get minimum wage, plus room and board for my son and I. Plus…it's the only place I've ever felt safe from the people that hurt me…that want to hurt me or Toya."

"What about… Is there a… Do you have anyone…besides Toya?"

"I don't have anyone except Toya. If there should come a day when I do, I want them to accept that I've been hurt in unforgivable ways and that I can't pretend that what I went through never truly happened. They would have to accept that I've been a victim and earn my trust…to earn my devotion and admiration. What about you? Is there anyone besides your daughter, Shado?"

"Nobody I can really stand to be around, no. Sorry."

"What about Shado? You seem to be the only one in her life. Where's her… Where's the lady that has the right to call herself her mother, not the one that was partially responsible for her being here?"

Shinji sighed and answered as simply as he could.

"Shado doesn't have a mother," he said it simply. "And the lady that was partially responsible for her being here is… She's long gone. Didn't have any time for her, anyway."

"Oh? My heart goes out to your daughter. At least she has you." She expressed her sympathies.

"Thank you. What about Toya's… The guy that gave you your son, but doesn't have the right to call himself a father? Where's he at a time like this?"

"Where are THEY at a time like this?" She corrected him, indicating that she had a much deeper trauma that ran deeper than the abuse of one person. "One's in the DOC, still waiting for the needle to end him… And the other one, he was…has been denied parole again because he wouldn't answer for why he did what he did. He won't even apologize for his crime. Neither one even cares for Toya, just like how she never tried to, either. I'm the only family he has… The only blood family that would bleed for him from out the heart."

"You're a strong woman for trying to be enough family for him," he praised her.

"What about you? Your aunt? Your uncle? Cousin?"

"Haven't seen them since Shado and I got here. Don't want to see them, ever again. I'm trying to be all the family I can be for Shado. The only one that doesn't want to hurt her by leaving her alone against their will or saying awful things to her like she doesn't matter when she does."

"Now, that's what I call a responsible father."

"Thank you."

On the jungle gym, Shado and Toya sat on the slide and peeked at their respective parents as they continued to converse.

"What do you suppose they're talking about?" Toya asked Shado.

"Probably about us," she suggested. "Or each other."

"Mommy hasn't made any friends with a similar past as hers. Maybe your daddy is the only one she can call a friend."

"Daddy hasn't had anyone else to speak with except me that hasn't been a complete fiend."

"You look out for your daddy?"

"Someone has to. His daddy is not a nice person. Everyone he has to see at this place under the city is not very nice, either. Even his aunt and uncle and their son weren't good people. If anything, Daddy's entire list of relations are just unfriendly people that hate him and don't explain why."

"Mommy's mommy hates her and myself. She wouldn't say why, either."

"You look out for her?"

"Like you with your daddy, someone has to look out for my mommy. She's all I have in my life. If anything happened to her… I'd have no one left."

"Me, too…but with Daddy."

Then, they noticed how their young parents seemed to laughing at something funny; Toya suspected that his mother had told Shado's father a joke she knew.

-x-

"…Finally found a name to go with that girl he's been seen with," Ritsuko informed Gendo in his office. "Rumiko Gaidoku. Age fourteen. Nothing in accordance with the Murduk Institute. Mother and father are Nikki and Shinoda Gaidoku, respectively. Known sibling is an elder brother named Yukito Gaidoku. The boy with her is her son, Toya."

"She's not a pilot candidate?" Gendo questioned.

"No, sir. Apparently, she's like the Third Child; neither attends the public school system…and both are teenage parents as a result of rape. Her case, however, was just as extreme as the boy's had been."

"Elaborate."

"From her medical records, the girl was a rape and incest victim at the hands of her father and elder brother. The police found out when the girl collapsed during a school field trip and was revealed to be pregnant. Her mother blamed her for the arrest and incarceration of her husband and son. The father's on death row and the brother was recently denied parole again for his role in the incest for refusing to divulge why he harmed his sister. There's no telling which one fathered her son because no DNA testing was performed on the boy, before or after his birth. The girl once requested an abortion, but her mother told her no. There were rumors of ongoing abuse, and then the girl and her son weren't seen for over a year. Apparently, the Third Child knew her personally."

-x-

"…So…will we see you later this month?" Rumiko asked Shinji as they and their children returned to the tea house.

As Shado yawned in exhaustion on her young father's back, Shinji responded, "It will kinda depend on my own schedule…and whether or not fate will be kind to us both like it was the previous few days."

"Good night, Shinji."

"Good night, Rumiko."

The two teen parents parted ways as the father took his tired daughter back to their apartment while the mother took her sleeping son into the tea house.

-x-

"…Maybe that's the reason they get along well," went Misato to Ritsuko, who had been informed by the faux-blond about the teenage girl that Shinji was seen with at the park. "They don't have anyone but their children after being disgraced by their families and live for them more than anyone else. Now that I think about it, there's been no mention of the boy having any number of friends since before he was left in his aunt and uncle's care."

"The going belief is that if you're the child of Commander Ikari, you're pretty much an omen," Ritsuko explained, "even if he claims to be nothing like his father."

"Well, he certainly proves that in the way he handles his own life and taking care of his daughter."

"But what about any emotional similarities?"

"I don't see any."

"Oh, subject change. The Second Child and Unit-02 will be here tomorrow."

"You think Shinji will be able to get along with Asuka?"

"With him, it's anyone's guess. Personally, however, I suspect that Shinji would rather be with this Rumiko Gaidoku than either Rei Ayanami or Asuka Langley Soryu."

"Clash between personalities that don't sync?"

"A complete lack of compatibility."

-x-

The next day came…and the unfortunate and disliked aspects of Shinji's schedule that clashed with personal interests were the need for NERV to have him undergo synchronization testing again for a few, short hours.

 _We didn't even exchange numbers,_ he thought as he carried his daughter on his back with the backpack containing their lunch, referring to Rumiko and he never getting each other's contact number so as to keep in touch.

"Oh, come on!" He and Shado heard a female voice ranting, and then saw a girl around Shinji's age kicking at a door that wouldn't open up for her. "I swiped my card in there! Open up!"

She was slightly taller than Shinji, had a fairer complexion than he did, and stood out more because of her long, red hair.

Shinji sighed and walked towards the access door several feet away from the redhead; he would rather not have anything to do with someone that seemed…unnecessarily rough. Plus, he had his child's safety to consider around people like that. He swiped his card across the panel reader and waited for the door to open up, which it did after two seconds.

"Hey, you!" The redhead made herself heard to him, but he ignored her, as she could've been talking to anyone other than him or Shado. "You! With the girl on your back!"

He stopped and turned to face her.

"Yes?" He responded.

"How do you get these dumb readers to work?" She asked him. "I swiped my card in seven times, and nothing happened!"

He set his daughter and the bag down and slowly approached the redhead.

"Show me the card, please," he requested.

She gave it to him and he examined it. There was nothing wrong with the card and the reader was working properly. So Shinji swiped the card for her, and the door opened; the difference between their swiping was that Shinji swiped slowly, whereas the girl swiped too fast.

"You need to swipe slowly so the reader can read the bar code properly," he informed her, and then left to get Shado and enter the facility.

Shado looked up at the redhead and then decided that she didn't like her as much as she did with Toya's mother when they met. There was just something wrong with her that put her in the same boat as the blue-haired girl.

"Daddy," she spoke to Shinji, "I didn't like that girl."

"Me, neither, sweetie," he expressed.

As they walked down the hall separate from the one the redhead went down and down an escalator, the little girl noticed the blue-haired girl from before.

"Daddy," she quickly informed her father, alerting him to the First Child behind them on the escalator. "The other girl."

Shinji noticed Rei and immediately picked his daughter up and walked further down the escalator, wanting to get as far from the albino as possible.

-x-

"…Hey, there, Katsuragi," greeted a man with an unshaven face, dressed in a suit without the coat and tie, on the bridge in Central Dogma. "Long time, no see."

"Of all the… You have some nerve being here." Misato expressed, irritated by his presence.

"Oh, I'm here on assignment. Currently on the combat roster for the duration of my time here."

"In case you haven't been informed, we do have enough problems with the Angels."

"Oh, I hear they're not the only problem you have around here."

Misato got the feeling that Ryoji Kaji was referring to the Third Child and his own predicament with the agency.

"It's hardly a problem if there's nothing being said that interferes with the situation," she told him.

"Yet, I hear the rumors about there being a little girl related to Commander Ikari," Kaji explained.

"Then you should check with your sources."

Suddenly, Shinji and Shado entered Central Dogma, followed by Rei and Asuka. The boy had an unhappy expression and the girl on his back had a concerned expression.

"I take it you two have already met Asuka?" Misato asked the young father and daughter.

"If you mean, the redhead," went Shado in response to the question, "then we have."

"Unfortunately," Shinji added; first they were followed by the albino girl, and then they had to put up with the redhead's presence when it turned out they were all going to the same location within the facility. "How long is the test today?"

Ritsuko, who was present, explained that the synchronization test for today was for three hours.

"What?!" Asuka responded, looking at Shinji and Shado. "Who the heck are these two?!"

"Ah, you must be Shinji Ikari," Kaji greeted the young father, extending his right hand. "I've heard a lot about you."

Unfortunately, Shinji, even if only one of his hands was needed to support his daughter on his back, didn't accept the unshaven man's hand.

"You'll forgive me for my antisocial behavior," he told the man.

"Right," Kaji responded. "And who might this lady be? Your sister? Cousin?"

Shinji didn't like this man asking him so many questions, and responded, "She's none of your business and off limits."

Shado tightened her grip around around her father's neck as she gave a fearful look.

"He's very protective of her," went Misato to Kaji, and looked to Asuka. "He's the Third Child and pilot of Evangelion Unit-01."

"No way!" Asuka gasped, disbelieving that Shinji was a pilot, simply because he was a boy. "Him?!"

"Only because Commander Ikari requested that he be here to pilot the Eva," went Rei, but Shinji acted like the girl didn't exist.

"Your father," Asuka said, not really questioning him.

"Unfortunately," he said simply.

Asuka looked at Shado, and then noticed how the girl bore a slight resemblance to the Third Child (and to a lesser extent, the First Child).

"You're both not big on talking, are you?" She asked the pair.

Shado didn't say anything.

"Not around here," Shinji said bluntly, "and not with them."

The boy then carried his child out of the room and left the people there.

"What was his story?" Asuka asked them. "And who was the little girl with him? What, his sister?"

"Afraid not," went Ritsuko. "His mother died when he was little."

"Stepsister, then?"

"Some people wish. His father never remarried."

"That was Shado Ikari," went Misato to Asuka. "Believe it or not, she's his daughter."

"What?!" She gasped, which Kaji also found disturbing, as none of his sources had anything about the Third Child having a daughter.

"If that's his daughter, then where's his wife?" He tried to make a joke of his question.

Both Misato and Ritsuko didn't answer him. It was something that was not very…worth a migraine because of how the daughter's origins were.

"It's complicated," Misato said instead.

"I'd hate to be the poor girl he got pregnant," Asuka expressed.

 _If only you knew the so-called girl, Asuka,_ thought Misato.

"Believe me," went Ritsuko to her, "you wouldn't want to know anything about her."

-x-

Within the plug, Shinji thought about the three people that really mattered to him in his life right now. While his daughter was his primary concern and anchor to whatever sanity he had left in this insane world, he was glad to see Rumiko and her son after what felt like a long time. There wasn't any other way he could explain his feelings toward a young woman with a child of her own that suffered in a similar situation as he had suffered; the only differences between the two were that he was a boy that was kidnapped and held for ransom, suffered from being scarred on his chest by his kidnappers and later raped by a woman old enough to be his mother and later had his child in prison before dying…and Rumiko was a girl that was never kidnapped, never held against her will for a ransom, but violated by two men she was related to and later abused by her mother that wanted to deny that her husband and only son were rapists and that there was a chance that her only grandson was also her stepson if he was fathered by her husband. Still, they were both parents to bastard children that needed them involved in their lives (and were as innocent as their parents weren't, anymore).

Out in the room that contained the testing plugs, Shado, sitting in a chair out of the way of the adults working, watching her father and the other girls on the monitors.

"Would it be wrong to say that every time his daughter's around, I'm tempted just to insist that she's left elsewhere?" Shigeru asked his co-workers.

Maya looked over at the girl and then at her father on the screen.

"I'd rather not risk keeping the girl away from her father," she told him. "I'd rather face an Angel than face a father that wants his daughter to stay close."

"Well, Rei's sync scores are improving after her recovery," Ritsuko told them, "but still below acceptable parameters. The Second and Third Children, on the other hand, are almost at the same level. Only the boy's a tad bit higher."

"Don't tell Asuka that," went Misato to her. "She'd hate him more than she dislikes him already."

Shado heard them, but paid them no mind as she focused more on her father than the other people present around her.

-x-

"…I wanna know how this is possible, Katsuragi," went Kaji to Misato on the bridge back in Central Dogma, referring to the Third Child and his underage parenthood. "He's only fourteen years old and the girl has got to be at least three."

"Four, actually," she told him. "It's not something that is easy to understand or accept. The girl's father is very broken and never got the help he needed back when he was younger…and just seems to make up for his damaged state by taking care of his daughter."

"Yet there's nothing about anything in his background that I have been able to discover that speaks about him having a daughter."

"That's because NERV doesn't have every bit of information on Shinji's past. It's like nobody wants to know anything about him, whether he's a regular school student or a kidnap victim that his relatives didn't want to pay a ransom for."

"So…what's with him and the girl?"

Misato sighed and explained, "Shinji was kidnapped by three people roughly five years ago and held for ransom, which his aunt and uncle had absolutely no intention of paying, and was found by the police a few days later. Unfortunately, the police were too late to save him from his physical and emotional scarring. He had a lot of skin carved from his chest in the shape of a star and was raped by the woman that was involved in the kidnapping."

"And somehow, he got her pregnant?"

"He didn't have a choice in the matter. The woman had his daughter in prison and died later. She was relocated to live with Shinji because he and the Ikaris were her only relatives that were neither dead or in jail, but it seems that her father was the only family that ever cared about her. He hasn't been back to school ever since he was informed of his fatherhood, so I have no idea of what his GPA is, but he doesn't strike me as being dumb. Not with his behavior and concerns for the girl."

"Some people self-educate or make things up as they go along through life."

"But with Shinji, it's different. After he fought against the Third Angel, he was dead-set on leaving, but Sub-Commander Fuyutsuki convinced him to stay awhile so long as we got the message that his primary concern was his daughter, not any of us, and she's off-limits to anyone here."

"Sounds like he perceives everyone as a potential threat to either himself or his daughter."

"I couldn't say for sure. He certainly doesn't give the Angels a second thought or the time of day. He beat the Fourth Angel senseless until its core shattered. And the day the Fifth Angel appeared, his daughter had the decency to install a sense of preparation in her father because even we didn't know what it was capable of, and she was unwilling to risk his safety. He sniped the Angel, but he wanted to know if we were done after that. There was absolutely no concern that the Angel might try to get back up and finish what it started. All I can say is that he's not what I expected when I met him and Shado the day the Third Angel attacked. I didn't expect NERV to recruit a rape victim and a preteen parent."

"Expect the unexpected, Katsuragi."

"We can expect this from him if anything happens to his little girl. I'd rather have with us against the Angels than to up and leave should she get hurt and die."

"Why not just leave her in a shelter during attacks or with a babysitter?"

"If it were easy for him to trust people older than himself, but he doesn't trust anyone here."

"How damaged would you rate his psyche?"

"On a scale from one to ten? Eight. Not too damaged to care for someone."

Kaji now wasn't too sure if even extended conversations with the boy were worth trying to get to understand someone that suffered from the harshness of adults and may have wanted nothing to do with any relationship with adults.

-x-

As she waited outside of the men's locker room for her father, Shado was calmly coloring away in a book. Something in her heart, a feeling or perhaps a premonition (not that she believed in such things, as they were unlikely) told her that the people here at NERV were only going to cause her father more pain than she knew him to be in already (he was good at hiding his pain, but she knew him to suffer from being in one of these giant monsters).

"…So you're really the Third Child's daughter?" She looked up and saw the redhead standing in front of her. "You're not his sister or cousin?"

She was bothered by her and simply returned her attention to the coloring book, hoping that the redhead would just go away.

"Excuse me?" Asuka continued. "I'm talking to you. Speak up! You're a girl, aren't you?!"

Shado didn't see how her being a girl had anything to do with speaking or not speaking. She really just didn't want to speak to her.

"She doesn't know you," she heard her father's voice and looked past the girl, seeing him looking unhappy about the redhead being near his daughter and bothering her. "And she knows better than to speak to strangers."

Asuka turned to face him and saw that he wasn't happy to see someone he didn't know or trust trying to engage in conversation with his child.

"Real hard to believe that she's yours," she told him.

"That's your problem," he responded, and walked around her to pick up Shado. "Let's go home, dear."

"Yay," Shado cheered as her father carried her out of the hall.

"Hey!" Asuka shouted at them. "They're foolish if they think they still need you to pilot the Eva, boy!"

If there was anything Shinji wanted to say to her in response to what she said, he certainly didn't say it out loud to anyone at the moment.

-x-

"…My God," Kaji gasped, being shown the scar on Shinji's chest when he was removed from the plug after the Third Angel self-destructed. "This is sick. He probably doesn't like anyone looking at his chest and asking him about it."

"As far as I know, the only people that have seen his scar are the doctors, Ritsuko, you now, myself and anyone that has seen the pictures. I can't say for sure if his daughter's seen his scar, but I wouldn't be surprised if she knew about how he got it."

"Maybe we should consider relieving the boy of his duties as an Eva pilot and letting him and his daughter leave the city."

"I would if I had command authority to do so, but Commander Ikari has the final say. Plus, I'm not completely sure, but Shinji may have met someone in the city that he can hang with without a problem and provide his daughter with a playmate."

"Oh, really?"

"It's only through the power of surveillance cameras dotted throughout the city. For about three days, he and his daughter have been spending time with a girl around his age with a little boy around her age. Going through some old files, it seems that Shinji actually knew the girl over a year ago."

"Girlfriend, perhaps?"

Misato looked at Kaji like he had spoken the wrong choice of words.

"I doubt that, and for obvious reasons," she uttered.

-x-

Putting his daughter to sleep for the night, Shinji, sitting at the table in the kitchen, looked down at his cup of ginger tea. He was wondering how Rumiko and her son were this evening. Wanting to guess how they were was better than the dozens of thoughts of other people he could care less for, especially the redhead he met today. He put her in the same category of people as he put the albino girl, which was comprised of women, young and old, that he wanted absolutely nothing to do with.

It didn't even matter if they knew more about whatever these Angels were and why they were attacking people than he didn't, or even if they had in their possession a type of beauty you wouldn't find elsewhere (not that he cared much about looks as he would care about personality and trust). If they rubbed him or Shado the wrong way, they were a problem that they didn't need to be bothered with. And add their category to the category for the men of similar degrees of problems, you get a third category that was people that were likely going to be the end of you or the only family you had that tied you down to the bits of clarity you had left, leaving either unstable…or beyond the touch of hope.

" _I heard the worst scars one can have,"_ he recalled Rumiko say to him at the park, _"are the ones that run deeper than the boundaries of the flesh."_

 _If that's true, then I have those scars that run deeper than my body,_ he thought in agreement with her.

To be continued…

A/N: How about that? Shinji can associate with someone that suffered a similar case as he did.


	7. Synchronization Concerns

Creation began on 08-26-16

Creation ended on 08-28-16

Neon Genesis Evangelion

Different from You: Synchronization Concerns

A/N: Ritsuko uncovers something that could hinder NERV's odds against the Angels.

"Oh…" Ritsuko sighs as she works on comparing the synchronization scores currently gathered with the ones previously evaluated. "Huh? What is this?"

She was looking at the scores belonging to the Third Child, and noticed a similar pattern that shouldn't have added up, but caused concerns for the faux-blond scientist. Rechecking the scores and then rechecking the systems associated with Unit-01, she was able to ascertain a matter that was likely serious for NERV to not overlook out of security priorities. She needed to inform Commander Ikari, immediately.

-x-

"…So, he's able to sync with the Eva," went Gendo to Ritsuko, who informed him of the matter, "but he's not synchronizing entirely with it?"

"To clarify," the faux-blond explained, "he's not connecting with the Eva's consciousness. He's able to make the Eva move, but beyond that and fighting the Angels, he's not getting any closer harmoniously with the Eva."

"Then what of the day with the Fourth Angel?" Fuyutsuki, who was also there in Gendo's office being informed, asked her. "His synchronization with the Eva kept rising as he bashed the Angel with his fists."

"That was just him. He…exerted his will over the Eva." Ritsuko elaborated. "He saw two people in place of the Angel that, in his mind, caused him more pain than anything the Angels might've done to him."

"In his mind, the worst monsters are the ones that look just like him."

"Exactly."

Gendo, however, was not impressed by this discovery. If the boy could synchronize with the Eva, but not with the spirit residing inside it, then his scenario could be compromised later on. It was a necessity for all the pilots to be able to synchronize with the souls inside the Evas. Why else have all the candidates in one location and with the same thing in common, being that none of them had their mothers involved in their lives?

"Could this just be a fluke?" He asked Ritsuko. "An error in the MAGI?"

"If only it were so," Ritsuko expressed, "but it isn't. This is an unusual case. Neither the First or Second Children have demonstrated a similar case like this."

"Could this have anything to do with what he went through five years ago?" Fuyutsuki suggested. "Something triggered by his trauma?"

"It's possible, but synchronization isn't affected by physical changes."

"He suffered from more than just a physical change."

-x-

Standing in front of Unit-01, Gendo pondered on what to do with the Third Child. It seemed like every time something went wrong with something, the teen was involved in some way. First, it was the fact that he had a illegitimate child conceived through rape by a woman that snatched him one day, and now it's this hindrance that he himself was causing.

"He's not reaching out to you, Yui," he said to the Eva. "This will cause us problems later if this is not resolved."

Naturally, the Eva didn't respond, but Gendo had the feeling that his wife heard him.

"He is, without a doubt, almost incapable of helping us realize our goal in the long run. Not when he refuses to understand that there are things more important than the life of a little girl."

If only Gendo could understand that his son would never see things his way or go to extremes as he was willing to. While he might have blood ties with the boy and the girl, in the eyes of most with a more…emotional understanding, this didn't make him a parent or grandparent in the least.

He could still remember the day he left the boy with his in-laws, how he begged not to be left alone with them…but Gendo never looked back.

-x-

If Shinji wasn't the one having recurring nightmares in the dead of the night every now and then, it was Shado, who had fallen back to sleep in her father's lap after waking up half an hour ago from a frightening dream. She described it as a city of darkness bathed in heavy rain, with herself running down a long street, trying to get away from the purple giant that he piloted, which, for reasons beyond her understanding, was moving on its own and was after her, and appeared more horrifying than it did already to her.

 _And I promised you that if things got too bad around here and you got hurt, I would stop piloting the Eva and we would walk away without a second thought,_ he thought as he looked down at her sleeping face. _I wonder if I asked her, would Rumiko want me to keep in touch with her?_

He got up and put his daughter back to bed.

"Mm…mmm…" Shado mumbled as her head made contact with the pillow.

Shinji chuckled and replaced the blanket atop her. Then, he sat across from her futon to admire her small form. Every time he looks at her, he finds new motivation to want to keep her close; she was the only family he had that actually wanted him around. His parents, his other relatives, anyone that has been alive longer than he had ever been or knew more than he ever could know that was affiliated with either the Ikari family or Rokubungi family didn't matter to him on any level that was just beneath the matter of his little girl.

It was for these reasons that he gave up on any relationship with the concept of family that was comprised of fathers, mothers, aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents, anyone that knew of her, spoke of him or just overlooked him out of spite or dislike. He just learned to cease any feelings of hope of reconciliation with these relatives and focused solely on his daughter. What point was there is in trying to have a conversation with a father that up and leaves you as a child and calls you back, years later, just to use you as cannon fodder? What worth was there in trying to remember a woman that had you and died young and you didn't even have a picture of her and all photographs and other mementos of her existence were cast aside? No, for Shinji Ikari, only Shado Ikari was deserving of the designation of family.

 _What is family to one that actually wants one?_ He thought, questioning himself over one of the questions that often ran through his mind. _What is it to one that never really knew it because those around him treated him like an invalid, an outcast, a parasite?_

He reached into his left pocket of his pants and pulled out an iPod Touch and looked at a picture that he had taken of them from before they arrived in Tokyo-2. It was just of he and Shado at the park one day; he had just acquired an unusual hat for his daughter that she had been eyeing for some time because it stood out among the hats at a vendor. A green one with the unusual feature of long, wing-shaped ears that reached down almost to the back or front of whoever wore it. The vendor that gave them the hat said they were in luck because it was the only one they had.

Sliding the picture away, he went to the next one, featuring Shado as a baby, very innocent of any unlawful acts that had been committed by the woman that carried her and had her in prison after harming him. He smiled at the picture; he would've walked away from the violence NERV attracted if it meant keeping her safe and allowing her to have a future. One that he would want to be involved in because he didn't want to echo the mistakes of his parents.

 _One of these days, Shado,_ he thought, turning his iPod Touch off and putting it back into his pocket. _One of these days, we're just gonna have a day out and forget about everything._

-x-

"…Maybe we should attempt brainwashing the boy," Ritsuko suggested to Gendo, "but we have no clue as to what effect it could have on his psyche."

"Would he forget everything?" Gendo questioned. "Would he forget about his kidnapping, his abuse, that girl?"

"It's possible, but if his relationship with the girl, regardless of who her mother was, is as strong as I suspect, his mind will resist letting go of any memories of her, even to the point of risking brain trauma."

If he didn't want to risk losing Unit-01's most unstable pilot, Gendo knew that NERV couldn't go and brainwash a teen parent with a bastard child that he put above the fate of mankind. If he was to get closer to his objective, however far it seemed now that he was aware that one of the pilots wasn't as cooperative with their weapons, he needed the boy as he was for the time being.

"Hold back on such a move until further notice," he told her.

-x-

"…Good morning, Daddy," Shado greeted her father as she stepped into the kitchen, seeing him preparing breakfast.

"Good morning, sweetie," Shinji greeted her back. "Did you sleep well last night?"

"Yes, Daddy."

"No other bad dreams about monsters?"

"Nope."

"That's good. Breakfast will be ready shortly."

Shado sat at the table and waited for her father to finish cooking.

"What are we doing today, Daddy?" She asked him.

"I'm hoping that nothing happens to get in the way of a potentially good outside," he told her.

To be continued…

A/N: How long do any of you suspect it will be until Shinji becomes aware that both his parents are far from honest with him?


	8. Two Wrongs, One Right

Creation began on 08-28-16

Creation ended on 09-18-16

Neon Genesis Evangelion

Different from You: Two Wrongs, One Right

Shinji was very disappointed when his NERV-issued phone rang. If it wasn't the testing that they needed him for, it was to face an Angel. It just reminded him to ask a serious question after this matter was dealt with, and that was to question how many Angels were to be expected. Plus, he had the day planned out for he and his daughter.

"Unfortunately, because the previous Angel is still being disposed of in the city, we need to deal with this Angel outside the city limits," Misato informed the three pilots present. "Because Unit-00 is still undergoing repairs, Units-01 and 02 will be sent to intercept the target."

Shinji sighed in acceptance of the operation.

"Do I really need to team up with Third here?" Asuka asked her. "I'm more than capable of dealing with the Angel."

"If this were true, I don't see why you chose to drag me into this," Shinji expressed his opinion.

"We don't know what this Angel is capable of, so we need two Evas," Misato explained.

"Sounds more like you just want insurance that this Angel is dealt with."

Misato couldn't fault him for believing that; ever since the previous attack, the only reason they were able to survive at all was because they followed the advice of his daughter. But they had no time to do so with this Angel, so they needed to fly blind.

-x-

The new Angel resembled the Third Angel mildly, but wasn't as big as it had been when Shinji had fought it. However, when Shinji noticed its torso area, he noticed that it had two cores instead of one, which, unfortunately, the Soryu girl either didn't notice…or didn't bother to care.

"Just stand back and watch me work, Third," Asuka told Shinji, and charged towards the Angel with a small spear in her possession.

Shinji didn't say anything to her. Whatever was going to happen, he was going to wait and see. If the Angel did something that caused the redhead agony, then it would be her fault for engaging it without first anticipating its capabilities.

Slice! Unit-02 had cleaved the Angel in half, but missed its cores.

 _If only I could believe it were that easy,_ thought Shinji, taking out Unit-01's Progressive Knife, just in case the Angel wasn't dead.

-x-

Shado didn't like this. She worried for her father. The fact that these people didn't take the same precautions as with the previous monster meant that they were willing to take extreme risks just to get rid of these creatures. Worse was just sending her father out against them without any guarantee that he could survive.

"You see that, Third?" She and everyone else present in Central Dogma heard the redhead say to her father. "A fight should be quick, clean and elegant."

There was no response from her father, but Shado suspected that he had nothing to say to her.

Suddenly, up on the monitors, the sliced Angel's two halves began to shift and jiggle. They shed out of a sort of skin-like husk and became smaller versions of the larger Angel, one brownish-red and the other bluish-white, each with its own core.

"Oh, that's a load of bull!" Misato gasped; it was a good thing that Commander Ikari wasn't here at the moment. "Quick! Attack!"

-x-

Seeing two of them didn't ease Shinji's mind, not in the least. In place of them, he didn't see two monsters, just two people that gave him much anger.

"Aah!" Asuka yelled as the two Angels ganged up on her and Unit-02.

They threw the red behemoth around until they were done with her…and turned their attention to Unit-01 and its pilot, who was brimming with anger as he raised the knife up.

Shinji saw the red one as his rapist and the blue one as his father, both wanting to torture him all over again like they did years ago and now.

"Shinji, you need to calm down," he heard Ritsuko say to him over the intercom. "Your synchronization's rising too high and your blood pressure is becoming elevated."

But Shinji wasn't hearing her. All he could hear…were the voices of his tormentors.

" _You should feel honored to be in my presence, boy,"_ the woman told him as she had gotten on top of him that day and raped him.

" _Certain actions must be employed,"_ his father said to him, angering him further during the time Shado was sick with the stomach flu.

 _It never ends,_ he thought, willing the Eva to charge towards them.

"Shinji, stop!" Misato ordered. "Stop!"

But he didn't stop, and slammed into the blue Angel he saw as his father, stabbing it in its bony faceplate and torso.

-x-

"…What is he, crazy?" Shigeru questioned, seeing Shinji's face contorted with rage, making him look psychotic.

Shado, seeing this side of her father, covered her face with her hands; she had seen him angry before, but this was new. This was new…and cruel because of the strain it had to be putting on his heart.

"The Eva has switched to its internal battery," Maya informed them all. "He has three minutes until Unit-01 shuts down."

"His synchronization's at one-hundred-forty and rising," said Ritsuko, now concerned that the teenage father was going to jeopardize everything.

On the screens, Unit-01 stabbed and ripped out the blue Angel's core, throwing it aside as the red Angel came by and grabbed it. But Unit-01 grabbed its bony faceplate and ripped it clean from its body, spaying a bluish substance into the air.

Misato was at a loss for words here. This was an extended performance of what Shinji did with the Fourth Angel, only it wasn't happening in the city, it was happening in the ruins of a former coastal city. The carnage he was demonstrating against the Angel's two halves was extreme. Too extreme.

The red Angel was then slammed into the ground, its arms and legs broken.

Unit-01 then took its knife and carved into its torso, cutting out the core.

"Good Lord," went Hyuga, just as the Eva now had the two cores…and smashed them together repeatedly until they shattered to pieces, causing the Angel bodies to perform a death rattle and then lay on the ground.

The Eva then fell to its palms and knees as it ran out of power.

"Unit-01 has gone silent," Maya informed them.

Shado removed her hands from her eyes and saw the results of her father's rage, wondering if he was alright inside the Eva now that the threat appeared to be resolved.

"What in God's name are we doing to this kid?" Shigeru questioned.

-x-

A punch to his locker, a fist-sized dent that was left in its door…and the bruised knuckles on his right hand, the result of venting rage. Nobody present in the locker room wanted to be near Shinji as he took deep breaths to calm his heart.

 _It was worse than before,_ he thought about the battle. _They wanted to hurt us both this time. Shado and I. They just wanted to hurt us both._

Outside the locker room, Shado sat across from it as she waited for her father to come out. She was certain that after what happened, he would just want to go back to their apartment and have a cup of tea. She didn't think he would want to go through any conversations with these people about what he went through facing the monster.

"…But if his sync ratio keeps rising and it's because of his unresolved issues with his father and a woman that hurt him," she heard the small woman from earlier say to the purple-haired woman from down the hall, "he could have a reaction that we never anticipated from the Eva. He could become psychotic. Maybe suffer cardiac arrest. His blood pressure almost spiked."

Shado tried to ignore them, but the danger her father was in was likely going to get worse because of what happened.

Misato noticed and told Maya to stop talking about the current situation, just as Shinji stepped out of the locker room.

"Hey, Shado," they heard him say, his voice a little raspy.

"Are you okay, Daddy?" Shado asked him.

"Just…a little heartburn," he told her, but Misato suspected that he was still recovering from the feedback from the Eva. "Are you ready to go?"

"Yes, Daddy."

He picked her up and turned to walk away, walking calmly past Misato and Maya.

"Wait, Shinji," Misato stopped him, which earned her an unhappy look from the teenage father. "Uh… Good work out there."

His expression lessened and he responded, "Thank you.", and returned to walking away with his daughter in his arms.

"Yikes," went Maya. "As much as I fear the Angels, I'm more afraid of what we're doing to him."

"Likewise," Misato agreed with her.

-x-

"…As unexpectedly beneficial as his unpredictable bouts of rage against the Angels in place of you and his rapist have been so far," went Ritsuko to Commander Ikari in his office, two days after the Seventh Angel incident, "the increased synchronization's having adverse effects on the Third Child."

"He nearly had a heart attack due to his heightened blood pressure, Ikari," added Fuyutsuki. "It might've still been one Angel, but it had two bodies, and your son was fighting under a time limit."

"What do you recommend, Dr. Akagi?" Gendo asked Ritsuko.

"Under normal circumstances, I would recommend that the Third Child be monitored more intensely to prevent the possibility of harm to himself or others," Ritsuko expressed, "but in this case, since I doubt that 'normal' is even a word that should be used, concerning his instability, I would have to recommend that he be removed from active duty until upgrades can be made to Unit-01 to ensure the safety of both the pilot and the personnel."

"Do you agree with Dr. Akagi, Fuyutauki?"

"I do…but only because he has a little girl to look after," Fuyutsuki explained; if the option were to separate the girl from her father, he would have to put his foot down against that.

-x-

Asuka was pissed as she went over the footage of the last battle, over and over again in her room. The Angel's two halves just came to life and took out her Unit-02, not only leaving her defeated, but embarrassed by what happened afterwards. They went after Unit-01 and the Third Child…who single-handedly defeated them within six minutes (the first half while still drawing external power from the nearby NERV energy source).

" _Sounds more like you just want insurance that this Angel is dealt with,"_ she remembered him saying to Misato.

"Who the Hell does he think he is?" She asked herself, ignoring the fact that the boy's file explained that he was damaged and never recovered from what he went through over five years ago. "I'll show him that I'm better than him."

-x-

"…Daddy?" Shado asked Shinji, seeing him sitting on the floor in the hallway.

Beside him on the right were a pair of Baording balls in a case that were used to relieve stress. They looked untouched; as stressed as her father could be from others, Shado rarely ever saw him use the balls to deal with his stress. He looked a little calmer than earlier, and turned to face her.

"Hey, sweetie," he greeted her with a small smile.

"Are you okay?" She asked him.

"Yeah," he answered her. "Yeah, I'm just a little tired, that's all."

Shado raised her left hand up to his face and placed it upon his left cheek.

"Are you still up for seeing Ms. Rumiko and Toya tomorrow?" She asked him.

"Of course," he answered her. "I'm hoping that tomorrow will be a stress-free day."

Shado knew he needed a stress-free day.

-x-

"…Here's the reason the girl the Third Child sees isn't affiliated with the Marduk Institute," Ritsuko explained to Gendo, finding new information on Rumiko Gaidoku. "Her birthday is registered as being on the Twelfth of September of Two-Thousand."

"The girl was born the day before Second Impact," Gendo realized, as it was also the same day he escaped the devastation of Second Impact by returning to Japan before the research on the First Angel was finished, taking the information he had with him at the time.

"Yes, sir, and as such, even if it were possible, she couldn't pilot an Evangelion, no matter how hard she tried."

Unless potential candidates were born sometime during or after Second Impact, they were incapable of piloting an Evangelion. This was actually theorized by Gendo's wife during the development of the original Evangelion, back when they were attempting to use adults to sync with the underdeveloped nervous system.

"There's something else, too," Ritsuko added. "She lists her employer as a Tendo Rokubungi of _Tendo's Family Tea House_. Does that name mean anything to you?"

"Tendo Rokubungi… Of all the… Where's the address?"

-x-

The next day at the park, as their single parents sat on the bench and watched them, Shado and Toya were sculpting tiny sandcastles in the sandbox.

"Is your daddy okay, Shado?" Toya asked the girl as he drew in the sand. "He seems… I don't want to say 'sickly', but does seem a little paler than usual."

Shado stuck a twig into the sand and said, "Some people Daddy works for have him working with a giant robot. It's not as easy as it seems."

"Like _Power Rangers_?"

"What's _Power Rangers_?"

"Never mind."

While they were still playing, their parents were still conversing on the young father.

"You don't look so hot, Shinji," said Rumiko to the boy.

"Yeah, I've noticed for a while," he agreed with her. "How bad do I look?"

"Honestly? You look like whatever it is these people have you doing is hurting you. I didn't say it yesterday, but when I saw you, you looked a little paler than usual, like you're turning into porcelain or something used in arts and crafts."

Shinji turned away from her and looked at his right hand.

"I must look a little dead, don't I?" He asked.

"Close to it," she confessed, turning him back to face her. "What the Hell are they doing to you?"

"I'm just one of a handful of young people charged with defending the best and worst members of the human race from inhuman invaders by using giant robots that connect directly to your nervous system. But it's hardly doing that that causes me unwanted agony. It's that man and that woman that hurt me and Shado, separately and together, in their personal ways, that causes me discord."

"I thought you said that woman was no longer involved with the present state of things."

"She is no longer involved…but that doesn't keep her ghost from sneaking up on me."

"How many people are there that you despise that cause you trouble?"

"Those two, that man's in-laws, those of NERV that get on my case when I don't listen to them when they should understand that my concern is my daughter, not them, some blue-haired albino girl that man cares for and some redhead girl Shado and I saw a few days ago."

"That's more than who I have to despise. It's just my parents and brother."

"You're a lucky lady."

"Just as your daughter is lucky to have you in her life."

-x-

"…What do you mean, the Third Child's suspended from active duty?" Asuka questioned Misato, discovering that the teen father wouldn't be involved in anything beyond synchronization tests for the time being.

"It was decided after the last sortie," Misato explained to her. "Before you got here, the last two attacks showed Shinji to be a little…beyond what we were expecting."

"Is it the kid that is said to be his or the claim that he was kidnapped and tortured by a woman?"

"It's not a claim, Asuka. What happened to him back then really did happen. Every time he faces an Angel, he doesn't see the Angel. Instead, he sees his father and the woman that hurt him, and everything becomes heightened to unstable levels. His blood pressure rises, his synchronization starts to go off the charts, and he's just on the borderline between someone who could live a long life…and someone that should be putting his affairs in order while he's still alive. If he even has any affairs to put in order, that is."

Unfortunately, Asuka only heard every other word Misato had told her and filled the gaps with other words that were never used. In her mind, it was, "A woman hurt him, his father causes him stress, his synchronization rises every time he faces an Angel, and he has a medical issue." She didn't see that Shinji was under more stress than anyone could be under during intense situations.

"Also, his sense of priorities aren't like ours," Misato continued. "While his service has been beneficial, we at NERV are a secondary concern that he thinks very little about. His first priority is always his daughter, who seems to be the only good thing he has in his life."

"Still, most boys would try to run when they find out they have kids."

"Well, Shinji isn't most boys. Honestly, half the time, I don't know what Shinji is. He is his father's son, but they don't behave in any way that is similar or identical to the other. He's not antisocial by choice…and he'd rather be elsewhere with his child than here."

"If that's true, then why keep him here?"

"Because we needed him to pilot the Eva. It was only sheer luck that he was convinced to stay awhile."

"So, he's a double-edged sword of sorts, then."

"What?"

"He's a threat to everyone, including himself."

"Actually, his daughter is the only exception to that claim; he never raises his hand to her, never yells at her. It's like he's trying hard to be a good parent to his little girl because nobody was ever good to him in his youth."

-x-

There was no denying it from either the father and daughter's silence. Even in the claustrophobic confines of the Entry Plug, Shinji really hated what he did at NERV. Honestly, totally, absolutely hated it with every fiber of his conscious. Even as he had confided in Rumiko, needing to confide in someone he could talk to that suffered as he had, it did nothing to relieve the tension he felt from the NERV personnel.

"…His synchronization ratio is holding steadily at ninety-seven percent," went Maya to Misato and Ritsuko in the testing room. "Blood pressure is elevated over one-forty."

"He's tense," said Misato in revelation, and then turned around to look over at Shado, who quickly returned her gaze from the holographic screens to her picture book. _He really needs to get a babysitter for her._

"On the other hand, his current score is higher than the First and Second Child's," Ritsuko expressed, which was true, despite the reasons why this was so.

"What was that?!" They heard Asuka shout; her communication channel was still on. "Crazy Third's synchronization ratio is higher than mine?!"

Shado could only hope that her father would just ignore the girl.

-x-

He just wanted some tea after having to put up with Ms. Soryu at NERV. Tea and some conversation time with Rumiko if she was available for just a chat. This was what Shinji had on his mind as he and Shado walked down the street to the tea shop.

"Ginger tea or ginseng tea, Daddy?" Shado asked her father as he carried her on his back.

"Ginseng tea, Shado," he answered as they reached the tea shop. "Hmm?"

"Huh?"

They noticed a pair of black Sedans with the NERV insignia on their front doors, and four men in black suits walking out of the tea shop, leaving in said cars.

"Daddy?" Shado spoke, concerned.

Shinji set her down and calmly led the way to the tea shop.

"Hello?" He made himself heard, seeing Toya sitting by himself at the countertop by the bar, coloring in a picture book.

His mother was by some tables, cleaning the tops and clearing them of empty cups and plates, looking irritable judging from the look of her face.

Shado quietly walked over to the bar and sat a chair away from Toya on the right.

"I take it you saw the men in black suits as they left?" Rumiko asked Shinji as she carried the tray of cups and plates behind the bar to go to the kitchen area.

"Yes," he answered her. "What were they doing here?"

"They wanted to speak with my employer, but I told them he wasn't here, that he would be gone for the entire week to restock on tea ingredients. We are running low on reserves here. We restock on tea and pastry ingredients every three months due to the declining economy in this city."

"I don't notice many people leaving the city."

"Don't care much for them myself, but I have to work for my livelihood. It's not like I do anything else with my time besides taking care of Toya."

Shinji then dug into his jeans' left pocket and pulled out his wallet.

"Do you still have ginseng tea?" He asked her.

"Sure," she answered. "And what for the little miss?"

"Shado, what kind of tea do you want?"

"Jasmine, please," the little girl expressed. "Or ginger."

"Coming right up," Rumiko declared as Shinji sat down at the bar beside their children.

-x-

"…So he wasn't there?" Gendo questioned Ritsuko in his office when he learned that Section Two returned from the location of the tea shop in the city.

"According to the girl that works there, he wouldn't be back until the end of the week," Ritsuko explained. "Because of the declining economy in the city, they have to restock every three months."

"Very well, then," he sighed. "Maintain surveillance on the Third Child and his daughter. I want to be the first to know when the tea shop owner returns."

"If I may, sir, what is so important about a tea shop owner?"

"If he is who I think he is, then he's someone I had believed to be dead for years."

"Someone you knew?"

"Someone I hate."

Ritsuko got the feeling that it was more than that if this Tendo Rokubungi was whoever Gendo believed him to be. For all she did suspect of him, Tendo was probably someone Gendo held a grudge against for some selfish reason.

-x-

Helping Rumiko close up the tea shop, Shinji explained his current status at NERV.

"They limited your duties there because of your past issues?" She repeated.

"Every so often, whenever I face a monster in that robot," he explained, "I don't see the monster. I see them. That man…and her."

 _Your father and your rapist,_ she thought. _Would I see the people I feel tormented by if it were I in your position, Shinji? Would I see my parents and brother in place of the monsters in a giant robot?_

"Ahh…" They heard their children yawn.

"Looks like someone's getting tired of the smell of tea," Rumiko suspected.

"It is getting late out," said Shinji to her, and put the broom he was using to sweep away and went over to the bar and picked Shado up. "Well, Rumiko…as always, it was great speaking with you again."

"Likewise, Shinji. Until next time."

Shinji carried his daughter out of the shop and Rumiko closed the door behind him and locked it. It was very different, talking to Rumiko than it was with others that were older than her or himself. They could just understand one another.

"Daddy?" Shado asked, already falling asleep in her father's arms. "Can I ask you something?"

"Yes, of course," he answered her.

"Miss Rumiko… Do you like her?"

"Yes, I do."

"I mean…do you like her?"

He didn't expect that line of questioning from her. And, of course, it wasn't something he could answer without some measure of hesitation. It wasn't that he didn't want to answer the question, but it was something he never took the time to consider at all. Ever since he took raising his daughter serious, and even after his rape, he never thought of wanting to make friends with others, even if he was able to.

But then, just on a Wednesday afternoon, making sure his daughter got good air at the park, he met Rumiko, who was doing the same with her son, whom he mistook for her little brother (which could have been possible). They just…met on a walkway and sat on the same bench that was present beside them. And then Rumiko made the first move in conversing with him.

" _How are you doing today?"_ She had asked him as he sat his daughter on his lap.

" _I'm okay,"_ he responded. _"Do you…come here often?"_

" _Only to make sure he gets fresh air. You?"_

" _The same. Brother?"_

" _No. Um…sister?"_

" _Um…no."_

When she turned away to look at a nearby fountain, Shinji noticed the small bruise on her neck. It reminded him of the bruise his aunt gave him when he confronted her about the neglect she showed Shado when she was crying from hunger the day he tried to go back to school. She had refused to explain why there were three bottles for her until he got back from school…and why they were not in the sink or something. The worst part about it was the feeling he had during the time he was at school, that something was just wrong, and he left out to be with his daughter, who needed him more.

 _When I asked about her bruise, she said her mother was a believer of tough love,_ he thought, reaching the apartment and stepping inside. _Of course, tough love is not love at all. It's just…pain._

Because Shado was already asleep, Shinji undressed her and put on her oversized, blue shirt and put her in her futon.

"Good night, Shado," he told her and kissed her forehead.

-x-

As Rumiko tucked her son in his futon, the teen mother turned away from the boy to look at a small mantle of pictures taken during their time in Tokyo-3. She picked up one of the larger ones and sighed at what she hadn't noticed for a long time. The picture was taken over by the mountains in the countryside, featuring her son, herself and her employer in front of an old temple; this was during one of her rare days off of work. Her employer, Tendo, was in his late-sixties to early-seventies (but the man didn't look a year over forty-five or that martial artist film star from China she had seen in those American films), with grayish-black hair, small wrinkles on his facial cheeks, and dressed in a gray and faded-green hakama, using a cane to support himself. What Rumiko hadn't noticed before, or rather, what she didn't try to notice, was that Shinji, in a subtle way, had an unusual resemblance to her boss.

At first, she wanted to disregard any suspicion about this, as it could've just been a coincidence; many Japanese men and women bore mild resemblances to other Japanese men and women. But there was something else about Tendo that made her think about Shinji, and that was an old picture that he had that featured a young man that looked like he had a terrible disposition or had been born under a bad star or something involving misfortune.

" _Who is this man here?"_ She had recalled asking him one time when she saw the picture.

" _That_ _…_ _was a man that would never know true peace or happiness for as long as he would live and so long as he refused to admit his faults as a person,"_ Tendo expressed; it wasn't the answer she had been wanting from him, but one she accepted out of respect for the elder.

But as she sat against the wall under a window that overlooked an alleyway, she couldn't help but feel that there was no coincidence in what she felt was a fact. She had to consider the possibility that Shinji, against many odds…was somehow related to Tendo, which meant that his father, as harsh as it seemed, was also related to Tendo.

 _Two wrongs, but only one right,_ she thought; the two wrongs being that her friend and fellow victim of sexual abuse and family-related discord and her boss were related to a bad man…and the one right was that she still cared about the two men as much as she cared about her son, despite his only sin being that he was fathered by either her father or brother (and she never wanted to know which was the one). _Dammit, Shinji._

To be continued…

A/N: What do you think so far? What do you think is bound to happen when Shinji meets with Tendo and they discover the truth?


	9. Maternal Regrets, Paternal Relations

Creation began on 09-18-16

Creation ended on 10-09-16

Neon Genesis Evangelion

Different from You: Maternal Regrets, Paternal Relations

Yui Ikari couldn't remember, for the longest time, where and when she thought that everything she strived for would be worth the sacrifices she made to ensure a bright future for all of mankind. She couldn't even remember the last time she saw her son as anything but her son, not some pawn in a twisted, unjustifiable game of chess. Even when he was inside the Eva, he was not with her, despite the smallest gap between them. She couldn't even reach out to him without inviting his pain from the deepest corners of his maimed heart.

His memories were nothing but agony with only the smallest bits of comfort that existed in the form of another child that had a resemblance to him. A girl he called Shado, his daughter.

 _He was raped,_ she realized, seeing his memory of the day it happened, and a woman who was old enough to be his mother. _He begged her to stop, even though he didn't understand what she was doing to him at the time._

It didn't even matter if the woman had died in prison almost a year later when she was arrested; the damage was done…and the little reminder of her existence was breathing the same air as her son was. But Shinji hardly saw any of his rapist in his child's features (and Yui couldn't understand how anyone could try and claim the girl looked anything like her mother when it was the complete opposite), only seeing her as a little child he had fathered from an undesired union with an older woman.

" _We really shouldn't be bothered with another child after what happened with this one that got kidnapped,"_ Yui's sister had explained her excuse to a policeman who brought over Shado as an infant sometime after her mother died in prison. _"I mean, we wouldn't even know the first thing about dealing with a girl like this, anyway."_

" _What do you mean, a girl like this?"_ The policeman questioned her.

 _She didn't even try to defend the fact that she didn't want her living with them,_ Yui thought, _but Shinji gave her no choice when he found out._

" _You're saying that…she's mine? This baby's my girl?"_ He asked the policeman. _"Doesn't that mean that I have a say in what happens to her?"_

And even when nobody would stop questioning him about what happened to him that day (or even how it felt to be with a woman, especially when it was his aunt that caused the majority of his stress during the time he was supposed to be recovering), Shinji was the one whose choice had the greatest impact, meaning that, despite his aunt and uncle's excuses, they had to open their home to Shado, even though Shinji had no idea what to do with a baby, except for what he had seen others did with their babies.

 _But Shinji adjusted to his fatherhood and learned on the fly,_ Yui saw how Shinji accepted his little girl's existence from the depths of his heart. _He fell in love with her the moment he laid eyes upon her, even though nobody else did._

One of the worst memories Yui saw was how Shinji gave up his school education after he realized that his aunt was purposely neglecting his daughter during the entire time he was at school one day…and realized that if anything happened to her that wasn't right, it would have shattered him. Her son, despite his youth, his pain, his disassociation with others, had to rely on his paternal instincts when dealing with Shado.

" _She's your problem,"_ her sister told Shinji, expressing her contempt towards the both of them. _"She's your mess. You and that dead woman's. I don't need to be troubled by either of you."_

" _Is that all we are to you?"_ He asked her, making no hint of his own disgust with her choice of words. _"We're just a pair of problems? A mess? Maybe we are…but then the same can be said about everyone else. I can understand that Shado may seem like an unnecessary waste of space to someone like you…and probably that woman that chose to have her, too. But that doesn't change the fact that she's my daughter, my waste of space that you view as unnecessary. You keep saying that I'm like my parents, but I'm nothing like either of them. You call them scientists and politicians, and I don't care about those at all. I might not even live long enough to even care about whatever profession there is out there for me. You can hate me all you want to, but she didn't do anything to you or anyone else to deserve the same level of hatred."_

His maturity ever since that day had alienated his already-alienated existence from most others of his age. But he was fine with that; even when he was isolated from others, he had Shado.

 _All that contempt, all that hatred,_ thought Yui, seeing the memory of her son getting his chest carved into by his rapist. _So…much…pain that he keeps bottled up so that he doesn't lash out at his daughter. He never wants her to see the side of him that he fears would hurt her…because he's afraid of turning out just like his parents…whom he has come to detest for their sins._

-x-

Gasp! Shinji awoke from yet another nightmare derived from his past memories.

Drenched in sweat and panting, he clutched his shirt, just below his neck, feeling the burning, phantom sensation of his scar.

The silence of the night brought no comfort to his tortured soul.

"Ahh…" He quietly whimpered.

It was his father and rapist. They had ganged up on him in the park on a nice and just started stabbing him in his chest and back, all the while making Shado watch helplessly. He laid back on his pillow, staring up at the ceiling. The phantom pain subsided and he slowly drifted back to sleep at two-seventeen in the morning.

He wouldn't wake until at least eight-thirty.

-x-

"… I take it the Third Child's taking another day off of synchronization testing?" Shigeru asked Maya in the testing room where the First and Second Children were currently.

"Doctor Akagi and I examined his synchronization scores last night," she informed him, "and she concluded that he needed a few days away from the Eva. Take a look."

She sent the data to his monitor, and he found it uneasy to comprehend.

"It looks unstable," he suggested; the recorded scores were fluctuating between ninety, one-hundred-sixty and almost two-hundred-ninety percent.

"That's because it is unstable," she revealed. "Some of the personnel suggested getting him therapy, but Commander Ikari was adamant that it was unnecessary. Others are starting to worry about what could happen in the next Angel attack and Shinji's involved."

"The next time an Angel attacks, the word 'doomsday' comes to mind," Shigeru expressed; his mind was already made up about the potential consequences in store for NERV if they put the Third Child in the Eva again. "But he's been suspended until the Eva could be reworked so that if he goes wild, it won't end up being unpredictable."

"I'm starting to have my doubts that anything we try will ever be enough," Maya confessed.

Standing behind the two and Hyuga, Misato watched one the screens as Rei and Asuka were going through the synchronization testing for the umpteenth time. She, too, had her doubts about whether or not what they were currently doing with Unit-01 would reduce the chances of Shinji going off like a nuke if he went up against the next Angel. There was a lot of fear being exhibited by the personnel about the commander's estranged son that spent most of his time taking care of a little girl.

 _But if the next Angel doesn't show up, we won't have to worry about what he might do,_ she thought, unable to keep from imagining the brutality Shinji could unleash against an Angel that he most likely wished he could just unleash upon his father or his other relatives, excluding his daughter, for all the things they either said or did to him.

"…But it looks like for the time being, the Third Child is enjoying his time away from NERV in the company of this teen girl with a boy around his daughter's age," she heard Hyuga say to Maya and Shigeru, recalling that the boy and his daughter were currently at the park almost heading away from the city where there were less buildings and more greenery by the lake. "If you ignore his mild paleness, you could say that he's rather average."

Misato couldn't deny that ever since the Fifth Angel incident, Shinji started to look rather sickly in his tone of skin, like he was dying or had contracted an anemic condition.

Ritsuko, who was investigating this, was unlikely to find the exact cause without suggesting that the Eva was somehow responsible.

-x-

Rumiko didn't think his scar was hideous at all when she asked to see it. In her mind, it just meant he had suffered from abuse that no child should suffer from. And then, she showed him her scarred back, as it was only fair; even though it was family-related, Shinji had to express that there was no such thing as a mother that would harm her children so brutally and say she did it out of love. An abusive mother or father, even an absentee one was not one at all.

"We're damned because of our parents, aren't we, Shinji?" She asked him as they sat on the bench, watching their children play with the tower viewer that allowed one a grander view of the other side of the lake.

"I can't say for certain," he responded, "but I say that we've been hurt by them in ways I know I can't forgive them for. Either physical or emotional, the damage is inexcusable and cannot be overlooked just because of other problems."

"The last time my mother ever touched me, she used the hairbrush on my back so hard, I bled."

"My aunt, may her soul burn in agony one day, tried to get Shado to crawl into an oven because she claimed it was dirty. She knew that it wasn't dirty. I should know. I cleaned it the day before. She wouldn't say it to me outright, but I suspected she was trying to do worse than hurt my daughter, make it look like an accident."

"That's some cold bull, Shinji. Did you ever try to report it?"

"How could I prove what she was trying to do back then? She would deny everything…and the police would believe her over Shado or I because nobody would take the words of Yui and Gendo Ikari's son and granddaughter serious. All I could do was keep a closer watch on Shado. It also made me reevaluate both the paternal and the maternal side of the family I found us revolving around. If someone like that man could just walk away from his duties as a father and not even be concerned with his own son getting kidnapped or… Then anyone like his wife and her relatives were just as capable of anything…and they could get away with foul play."

They looked at each other and Rumiko knew he was right. If she could be made a victim of sexual abuse by her father and brother, who both went as far as to go and take turns on her, then her mother was likely able to do away with her and claim it was an accident after everything that happened before she packed what she could of her and Toya's things and ran away in the dead of the night to get away from the abuse. And the only reason she went and made her have Toya was because she felt it was only right when she found out Toya's gender.

" _You helped lock up the two men in our family,"_ she told her. _"You owe us a new one."_

 _I wonder what she might've done if Toya was a girl instead?_ She wondered.

"Whoa!" She heard Shado gasp as she fell on the ground.

"Sorry, Shado," Toya apologized to her, helping her back up.

"I don't think I've said this before, but Toya's quite a gentleman," said Shinji to Rumiko.

"Thank you. I've taught him how it is necessary to be respectful towards girls. If you treat them with kindness, they will treat you with kindness in return."

"Thank you, Toya," they heard Shado say.

Shinji chuckled a little, but then felt like his left shoulder was bruised a little because it started to feel sore.

"Are you okay, Shinji?" Rumiko asked him.

"Just a little sore," he stated. "It comes and goes."

"Maybe you should see a doctor for it."

"No, it's nothing. I'm sure by tomorrow, I'll be alright."

Rumiko then looked away from their children…and noticed a black Sedan with that ridiculous insignia of that organization Shinji worked.

"Okay, I don't know if they're spying on you…or if they're spying on me," she told him, pointing the car out.

"Son of a…" He muttered.

-x-

"Uh-oh," went Shigeru, seeing the girl Shinji was with pointing at the Section Two car.

"You wanna get out of here, Rumiko?" Shinji asked her.

"Yes, please," she answered back, getting up off the bench. "We really don't need this to aggravate us further. They showed up at the tea shop once, but this is just wrong."

"Probably that man's idea of keeping an eye on me. But he's not really doing anything."

The two picked up their children and left the park.

"Well, we know that both teen parents don't like being followed or spied on," went Hyuga, watching the two teens carry their children further away from the surveillance cameras present.

"But who were we really watching?" Maya asked. "The Third Child…or his friend?"

-x-

"…Well, this is my room," said Toya to Shado, showing the little girl around his room above the tea shop, albeit nervously.

"Lovely," she expressed, looking at the small collection of action figures and board games that were present on the small table by a window. "Are these what you were talking about before?"

"Uh, no, those are from the _Godzilla_ franchise."

"The giant dinosaur that breathes blue fire?"

"Yeah."

As Toya sat on the floor and showed Shado his action figures as she grabbed a board game for them to play, in his mother's room, Rumiko and Shinji sat down on the floor and started drinking tea as said boy looked around said girl's room.

"Hey, you have a great place," he told her. "Really."

"Thank you," she praised him, pouring him a cup of herbal tea. "My boss, he's…very caring and understanding. I owe him a lot for taking my son and I in."

Shinji then looked up at her small mantle of pictures and noticed the one she seemed to admire a bit more than the other ones.

"Is…is that your boss?" He pointed to the picture.

She looked at it…and answered, "Yeah. That's him."

"Uh… I hope this is alright if we see him later. I would've invited you and Toya to our place, but with the unwanted followers…"

"Oh, no, no, it's nothing like that. I don't… You and Shado are the only ones that have ever been up here. I don't have anyone besides Toya and my boss that I could call a friend or confidant, and there aren't that many kids in this city that are around Toya's age for him to play with. It's…been a long time."

Shinji sipped his tea and then set his cup down on the table.

"Can I ask you something that is a little personal, Shinji?" She asked him.

"You can, but I can't promise to answer," he replied.

"When you saw me that day after more than a year since we last met… Did you ever…think that we wouldn't meet again?"

Shinji remained silent, in thought of the question…and then sighed.

"I never thought I'd get to see you again. You were the only one that didn't discriminate me because of my relatives or my early parenthood. I respected and sympathized with your agony and everything you went through because of… When you disappeared, nobody bothered to ask me if I knew where you went. I read the papers in hope that there was some mention of you, but I never saw anything about any kidnapping or runaways. So I tried to forget about you…to keep from feeling any further pain. When you forget about a certain amount of things, places and people…you can forget about the related pain to a certain extent."

"I hurt you…and I am sorry."

"I don't blame you. I blame your mother. There was something I read that was written a long time ago about honoring one's parents, but I don't believe that. _'Honor thy father and mother'_. How do you honor the people that you don't even know or remember…or have caused you some form of harm? Do you know how?"

"You don't, Shinji. It's not like they honor you or anything. It's a mad world with people without a shred of mercy or remorse for whatever they do, whoever they choose to harm."

Shinji then drank the remainder of his cup of tea.

"Is it alright if I ask you a personal question? Which you're free to not answer at all, of course." He asked her.

"Yeah, sure," she replied.

"I'm a guy, so I can never understand why or how… What was it like…when you had Toya?"

Rumiko would've been fooling herself if she pretended not to hear that question. She would've thought herself a greater fool if she told Shinji that he wasn't the first person to ask her what childbirth was like for her. Of course, he was the first person to ask her, to really bother asking her, and his reason for doing so was simply because he couldn't understand the why or how that revolved around it all, simply because he was a guy. And, of course, being a girl, she would know from personal experience.

"Don't get me wrong, though," she started. "I do love my son. My mother, however, she went and decided everything for me, whether I agreed with her decisions or not."

She then refilled his cup and her own with more tea.

"Go on," he encouraged her.

"When it was discovered I was pregnant, the doctors went and told my mother and suggested that I get an abortion on account of my age and development, not just because of…who Toya's father might've been. Of course, she said no, even when I felt I should get it. Part of the reason she wouldn't… She always found a reason to blame me for whatever reason that involved me. I helped put my father and brother away, and she said I owed our family a new man when she found out Toya would be a boy. So…for eight-and-a-half months…while I should have been looking forward to seeing him, I felt suffering with every breath I took. My single regret back then…was that I didn't try to go to a neighbor's place or run to the hospital. When you have a mother that works as a nurse, a hospital pretty much becomes meaningless."

Shinji, his left hand trembling with the tea cup, couldn't believe what he was hearing about her past experience. He quickly set the cup down and uttered what he knew had happened to her.

"She made you have Toya at home," he sighed in revelation.

"Yeah," she revealed, remembering how her water broke in her sleep that night. "Worst thing of it was that she didn't do much in helping me, not even encouraging me properly. I screamed and cried…and all she did was grab and pull. I never felt more pain than anything else in my life up to the present day. It was like my skin down there was being peeled away, slowly and painfully. It went on for five hours…and I just wanted to die, right there and then because I felt like that was happening to me. I was dying."

Rumiko then drank the rest of her second cup and placed it down on the table.

"She had some nerve to tell me how women had to endure the pain of childbirth long before an epidural was even a reality. Anyhow, when it was finally over, I must've passed out sometime during or after he was born because the next thing I knew, I was waking up to the new day…with a sore pair of legs with blood on my inner thighs. I didn't start lactating until a month later, despite my chest being sore, and so my mother slapped me around, thinking she could get me to do what nature does at a chosen time and course. My personal experience with pregnancy and childbirth is that of agony…and resentment towards my parents and brother. I really do love my son, regardless of the way he came to life…but I hate my parents and my brother. Truth be told, I don't ever want to see them again for as long as I may live on what's left of this mortal coil."

Shinji saw a tear escape from her left eye…and slowly, calmly…placed his left hand upon hers across the table.

"I am sorry for the way you and Toya have suffered," he told her.

"Just as I'm sorry for the way you and Shado have suffered," she responded.

It was a moment later that…a maternal rape and incest victim and runaway…and a paternal rape and neglected victim…closed the gap in between them.

-x-

 _"…You and Toya have suffered,"_ Shinji's voice in the recording from the Section Two agents that were watching outside the tea shop uttered on the tape player in Gendo's office.

"… _You and Shado have suffered,"_ Rumiko's voice came and went.

Gendo, Fuyutsuki and Ritsuko were all listening to the tape recording.

"… _Shinji…I've really missed you."_

" _I've missed you, too, Rumiko."_

"Well, it appears that these two have many things in common," suggested Ritsuko to Gendo.

"They both feel they've suffered because of their respective parents or other relatives," Fuyutsuki defended. "Miss Gaidoku was forced into a hurtful position by her mother because of what her father and brother did to her, and Shinji can relate to her suffering."

"Except his rapist was unrelated to him."

"It was still rape if they didn't consent…or were even fully aware of what was happening to them, and they were both abused by other relatives later on, either physically, verbally or even emotionally. They're both scarred by their trauma and both have to live with the end result, being their children."

"Where is the Third Child now?" Gendo, who remained silent during the entire recording being played, asked them.

"According to Section Two, he and his daughter spent the night at the apartment above the tea shop," said Fuyutsuki to him.

Gendo flexed the fingers of his right hand, feeling threatened by this turn of events.

-x-

It was the first sleep he had in months that was good without the feeling of mild pain. It was also the fourth time in a while that Shinji awoke to find himself in a different setting.

 _Did I fall asleep after drinking all that tea?_ He wondered, getting up off the floor of Rumiko's room. _I can't remember anything after hugging her._

"Ahh… Shinji?" Rumiko's voice was heard as she awoke, having fallen onto her futon before passing out last night. "What happened?"

"I think we drank too much tea…and passed out as a result," he suggested, relieved to be wearing his clothes from the previous day still. "Uh, Shado. I've neglected her."

"Same here with Toya," she realized, and both got up and left out her room and into the kitchen, where both children were, eating cereal at the table.

"Good morning, Mommy," Toya greeted his mother.

"Hey, Daddy," said Shado to her father. "Did you two sleep well?"

"Uh, I… I slept fine, sweetie," Shinji confessed. "Are you two alright?"

"We're fine," Toya answered. "We got up a few minutes before you two did. Since you were still asleep, we just went and had cereal."

Rumiko went over to the kitchen stove and started heating a teakettle.

"We're not big on coffee these days because of the shortage," she told Shinji.

"It's okay, really," he accepted. "I'm not a coffee person myself and I don't let Shado have any because of the possibility of caffeine addiction."

Five minutes later, the two teen parents were waking up to the new day with jasmine tea.

"Why tea, Rumiko?" Shinji asked her.

"Tea is good for the body and soul. The remedies rejuvenate the cells in the heart and bones and revitalize the harmony in the spiritual aura. Tea is Mother Earth's blessing to all of mankind."

"That probably explains why I prefer tea over other beverages, including milk."

HONK-HONK! A vehicle's horn was heard, and Rumiko walked over towards a window that looked out the back of the building into the empty alleyway, seeing a blue and white truck pulling into the driveway of the tea shop's space.

"My boss has returned," she told them.

-x-

"Section Two has reported that a truck has parked in the alleyway behind the tea shop," Ritsuko informed Gendo. "It's registered to Tendo Rokubungi."

"Have they obtained footage of the man?" He asked her.

"They're about to."

-x-

As Rumiko opened up the garage door for the restocking to be done, she saw Tendo stepping out of the truck, rotating his right arm a few times.

"Good morning, Tendo," she greeted him as he reached into the truck and pulled out something small and shiny.

"Good morning, Rumiko," he responded back, and approached her with the small item in his left hand. "I was able to find you one like mine on the way back."

It was a gold medallion or pendant with a man's face and designation engraved into it, dangling from a silver chain.

"Truly?" She asked him. "They still had trinkets associated with the saint?"

"Wouldn't spend my time looking for another saint. It has to be this particular saint or no saint at all. He was responsible for my taking you and Toya in, even when there was reason to."

Rumiko held out her right hand and Tendo gave her the trinket. She looked at it and smiled. It was Jude, one of the Apostles and the Patron Saint of Lost Causes. Both she and her boss had the belief that, regardless of the religious aspects surrounding the ancient man, Jude was a great example of any lost cause that could still have a place in the world that existed; even though her chances for a good education were slim to nonexistent, Tendo still saw potential in Rumiko to be something great in her later years, even if she started motherhood prematurely and against her will because of the actions of her family.

"Thank you," she praised Tendo. "There is someone I feel you should meet."

"Oh?"

"Yes." She led him into the building and stopped between the stairway and the apartment it led to, spotting Shinji, who had waited there at Rumiko's request. "Tendo, this is Shinji. Shinji, this is Tendo, my boss."

"Hello, sir," Shinji greeted, bowing his head to the elder.

"Well, hello, Shinji," Tendo responded. _No, it couldn't be. While the resemblance is mild, maybe less than mild, he can't be related to him. I always thought he was dead._

-x-

"This is him?" Gendo asked Ritsuko, looking at the picture of the elder that had gotten out of the truck.

"Yes, sir," she answered him.

Gendo couldn't believe this. Of all the people fortunate enough to survive Second Impact, he had to be one of them.

"Where is the Third Child now?" He demanded.

Suddenly, Ritsuko began to wonder if there was more to this tea shop owner than what Gendo wasn't telling her. And based upon the guy's picture, he was past his prime, a pushover, nobody to be concerned about because he was going to die, eventually.

"He left the tea shop with his daughter an hour after helping the Gaidoku girl carry several crates into the building," she answered him. "They returned to their unit."

"Bring him here," he ordered. "Immediately."

-x-

"…Her boss seemed like a really nice man, Daddy," Shado told Shinji as she sat on the stool whilst her father scrubbed her back in the bathroom.

"Yeah, he did seem nice," he agreed with her.

"But?"

"But?"

"Isn't there a 'but'?"

"Yes, but it's probably nothing."

"But?"

Scrubbing her left shoulder, Shinji sighed and expressed, "I don't think he liked me when he saw me. It's just a feeling."

Since she wasn't there when they met, Shado couldn't say for sure if her father was right about Rumiko's boss at the tea shop. All she could assume, however, was that maybe the elderly man was unlike the other elderly people she had seen. Maybe even the first elder she actually had a positive opinion on due to him owning and running a tea shop and sharing his home with Toya and his mother.

"Okay, your back is all washed up, dear," Shinji told her, handing her the wash cloth before he turned around to face the bathroom wall.

"Thank you, Daddy," she told him, getting up off the stool and climbing into the bathtub. "Okay, you can turn back."

He turned back and sat down on the floor beside the tub, raising his left hand to his neck, tugging at his shirt.

"Is your chest hurting again?" She asked him.

"Just a little bit," he explained. "It's nothing serious."

She looked at the top of the scar that stuck out from under his shirt and noticed it seemed bruised and almost reddish, like it was burning or something. It didn't look like that before over a month ago, but it was starting to seem like it getting irritated from that giant robot that he operated and used to protect her (and Toya and his mother, when she thought about it) from the giant monsters that nobody seemed to know more about.

"Daddy, it could be bad," she told him, pointing to the old injury.

Shinji couldn't help but feel like he was lying to his daughter about how bad his past injury was starting to look.

"Okay, when you're done here, we'll go see a doctor about it," he promised.

-x-

Misato, fearful of what Shinji might do if he tried to resist, brought the four Section Two agents assigned to watch him, and rang the doorbell; the thought of calling him was deemed ineffective because Commander Ikari ordered him brought to NERV HQ, immediately.

There was the minor sound of footsteps and the door opened, revealing Shinji with a half-wet shirt and the top portion of his scar visible, looking bruised and red. The chain was still on, since Shinji didn't have time to remove it and this was an unexpected visit from unwanted visitors.

"Hey, Shinji," she greeted.

"Unless this is just an unwanted social call or because of an Angel attack, give me one reason not to shut the door," he told her.

"I'm here under orders from your father to escort you to him, immediately," she explained.

Shinji frowned and responded, "What does he want?"

Before she could even answer him, she reacted to something different and unexpected.

"Oh, dear," she gasped, covering her mouth.

Shinji felt a bad taste in his mouth and something on the right side of it. He reached up and felt around it, pulling his right hand back and seeing a smear of red on his fingers and palm.

"Okay," he sighed, closing the door to remove the chain, letting her inside. "I promised Shado I would see a doctor, anyway. For my scar."

She stepped inside and followed him to his room where he grabbed his jacket, but decided to change his shirt and removed it.

"Shinji," Misato gasped, seeing his scar looking like it was burning because of its reddish coloring. "Your… You really need to see a doctor."

"Daddy?" Misato turned around and saw Shado by the door, still drying off and dressed in a brown shirt and blue shorts. "Oh!"

He quickly covered his torso up with a gray shirt and put on his coat.

"She's here because of that man, isn't she, Daddy?" She asked, referring to Misato.

-x-

"…People that experience bouts of abuse are often attracted to those that have suffered from an identical or similar form of abuse," Tendo expressed, helping Rumiko prepare eight cups of tea for their customers currently waiting.

"I'm sorry?" Rumiko responded, confused by his choice of words.

"Your friend, Shinji. You like him a lot, don't you?"

"Well, yeah. He's a friend, we have similar interests, he's easy to talk to… What's not to like about him. Plus, he has that little girl of his."

As he placed three pastries on one serving tray, Tendo questioned, "Is that all, Rumiko?"

"Oh," she went as she placed the five cups on the second tray for the five patrons. "You're asking if I…like him in that way?"

Tendo nodded in the positive.

"It's a question I don't think about, Tendo. You know my reasons for never wanting to think about boys like that. I know that not everyone is like that, but there are always consequences…a price that can't be paid in ways you wish they could."

"At least your honesty answers for questions difficult for you to answer. Heh. Personally, Rumiko, I believe that young father is lucky to know where to find you. Even if a person likes tea, it takes more than a beverage made from hot water and leaf and flower bits to motivate a person to come around here. Even if two people who were victims to the cruelties of society and are surrounded by those that will often look the other way, even have people they look after because nobody else will do right by them… They have the same right to be happy."

"Uh, Mommy? Mister Tendo, sir?" They turned to face Toya, who came running into the back. "One of those black cars with the men in black suits is outside the shop again."

Tendo sighed and uttered, "I'd better see what these suits want…if they're not here for tea and pastries. The sooner they leave, the better."

Rumiko feared for her boss. All Shinji told her about these men was that they were an eyesore, worked at NERV (and by extension, worked for his father), and weren't the type of company anyone wanted around. And if what she suspected was accurate, then it was most likely the reason these Section Two agents was because of a personal reason and not a professional one. These days, personal reasons for anything outweighed the professional ones.

"Ahh…" She hissed a little, feeling a little pain on her back.

"Are you okay, Mommy?" Toya asked her.

"Yeah, I'll be fine," she answered him.

-x-

"…What's wrong with him?" Asuka asked Misato, seeing Shinji being carted off by a medical team.

"An old injury he got from over five years ago started acting up," she explained.

Asuka then noticed the Third Child's daughter sitting by herself in the waiting area, holding a small object in her hands.

"What's the worst-case scenario if he becomes incapacitated?" She questioned.

Misato looked over at Shado and came to the assumption that Asuka's question wasn't exactly out of concern for either the little girl or her father.

"Let's not go there, Asuka," she told her. "It's not worth it."

-x-

"…His high synchronization may be the cause of his injuries," went Ritsuko to Gendo in the latter's office.

"Is there any way to remedy this?" Fuyutsuki questioned her.

"We're still trying to adjust the Eva and reduce his synchronization to below one-hundred-ten, but we're still looking at another day before any improvement occurs."

"What is his current medical status?" Gendo asked.

"At present, he's in stable condition, but the doctor requests that he be kept overnight in case his scars starts bleeding again."

"Again?" Fuyutsuki asked.

"It started bleeding the second he arrived here."

"Any chance his injuries were self-inflicted?" Gendo questioned her.

"No, sir, and there's been no indication that the Third Child so much as practices self-mutilation, whatsoever." She answered him

Ring-ring! The cell phone in Ritsuko's pocket rang and she answered it.

"Yes?" She responded. "What do you mean, he has a visitor? Very well, then. Let her in."

As she hung up, she informed the two men that Ms. Gaidoku was currently here and had been requested to show up by the Third Child's daughter.

-x-

Shinji awoke from his drug-induced stupor and looked up at a blurry figure that his vision focused on until it became the form of a young woman with shoulder-length, brownish-black hair and gray eyes. He saw Rumiko looking down at him.

"Rumi…ko…" He uttered, raising his right hand up to her face.

"Hey," she responded, taking hold of his hand. "How are you feeling?"

He tried to rise up, but couldn't. Also, his chest felt like someone had cut into it all over again. If anything, both teens assumed that the doctors probably applied some sort of pain-relieving paste on his torso and covered him in bandages.

"Shado?" He asked her; he really didn't care about himself right now.

"She's fine," she answered him. "Toya's with her right now."

"How…did you…"

"Shado called and requested I should be here to support your recovery."

"She did?"

"She said you'd probably get your spirits lifted if you saw a friendly face your age."

Shinji chuckled at his daughter's concern over his medical status.

"Could you tell her that my spirits have been lifted?" He asked her.

"Sure," she answered him.

-x-

"…Looks like you can't ask him whatever he knows about the tea house owner until after he recovers," Fuyutsuki told Gendo.

"His old injury inconveniently saved him from being questioned," he expressed bitterly.

"Why the suspicion about a tea shop owner?"

"It's not your concern."

"Well, it's a major misuse of time and personnel if there's no reason for wanting to know why. From my perception, this is just a man that runs a small business meant for the sole purpose of providing tea and pastries to paying customers…unless it's personal…and you think your son or his friend knows something about him that you might also know and suspect them of knowing."

"Again, it's not…your…concern."

Fuyutsuki knew right then and there that he struck a nerve in Gendo's attitude about this mysterious man that he wanted to know whatever it was his son knew.

"He may not know anything," he told him, "and it would be hazardous if we were to stress him with asking if he even had one conversation with him or not. It's already most likely that piloting the Eva has caused him his past injury to become a current issue."

-x-

Even though Rumiko had offered to watch Shado for the night and morning after, Shinji was adamant that she be kept within his sight; it wasn't that he didn't trust her, but that he lived with the fear of what could happen to her every time she was out of his sight on account of him not trusting adults.

She couldn't blame him, though; she had the same trust issues, with Tendo being the only exception because he wasn't… Because her boss was a trustworthy person that hadn't laid a bad hand on her or her son.

"Mommy, do you think Shado and her father will be alright in that place for the night?" Toya asked his mother as they walked behind the tea shop to enter Tendo's residence.

"I'm not sure, baby," she responded, just hoping that Shinji would recover from his unexpected injury. "Shado's father's gotta be a fighter, though. He wouldn't leave her alone."

"Maybe we should've stayed with them."

"Believe me, I wanted us to stay with them, but I didn't trust those people there. And then, there were those men in the suits again."

"Ugh! Those men were scary, always looking at you."

Unlocking the back door, she made Toya enter the residence first. She turned back to look around the alleyway and saw nobody around. Paranoia had a tendency to make her feel threatened by possible stalkers. Then, she closed and locked the door.

-x-

"…You really shouldn't be out of bed, young man," a female nurse told Shinji, seeing him sitting in a chair with his daughter on his lap, looking out the window.

Shinji looked up at her and she hesitated from going near him; if his daughter wasn't asleep and holding him or even in the same room as he, he probably would've raised his voiced at the woman to simply go away, that he was fine, and that just having his child close by helped him a little more than medication could on an emotional level.

The nurse got the message and raised her hands defensively as she backed away and left the room. It was his eyes. They were like knives, but they were blunt…and very directed.

"Is something wrong with the boy?" Ritsuko, who was present in the hallway, asked the retreating nurse.

"That young man doesn't want to be disturbed when he's sitting with his girl on his lap," she told her as she walked away. "He puts that kid before himself."

Ritsuko stuck her head inside and saw Shinji just trying to ignore the world around him as he sat in the chair with his daughter's sleeping body. And then his head turned to face her…and she saw no comparison between him and his father as she left.

 _I'm beginning to wonder if piloting the Eva affects this boy much differently than the First or Second Children,_ she thought, since Shinji was the only boy NERV had (not to mention, he was the first boy to ever pilot an Evangelion). _Synchronization isn't affected by physical changes in the body, but we never studied the psychological effects it may have on the pilots, especially one that is so damaged from trauma._

" _He was kidnapped."_

" _He was tortured…"_

" _The woman raped him…"_

"… _The police didn't find him until a few days later…"_

"… _His aunt and uncle didn't seem all that concerned about what happened to him when he was found and taken to the hospital…"_

" _He looked like he saw Hell wrapped in wrath and lust."_

Ritsuko had read the reports of what happened to Shinji a little more and found the trauma to be a bit more than what any child could handle. And with everything that has happened so far, she had to consider the option of cutting the boy loose so that he may live peacefully with his daughter. Unfortunately, she knew that was unlikely to happen because of one fatal problem with that option: Gendo wouldn't consider it, no matter what happened to his son.

-x-

Rumiko wanted to regret asking Tendo what she had suspected, but couldn't shake off the assumption she had.

Tendo wanted to disregard Rumiko's assumption, but didn't deny what she suggested in her questions. Even he had to admit that it was possible, as stranger things have happened in the last fifteen years. He had lost his friends, his father, his wife and daughter because of Second Impact, threw himself into his tea shop business in an attempt to numb the pain he felt, even found some comfort in the presence of Rumiko and her son. The mere suggestion that he had some family out there in a world maimed by a mysterious disaster was somewhat ludicrous to him, but it was hard to disbelieve.

"What would make you believe such a thing?" He asked her as they sat at the kitchen table.

"The comparisons I tried to see between you two every time I look at your photos and when I'm with him," she explained. "It's common knowledge that some people often look alike, but what are the chances that the resemblance is more than just a coincidence?"

"Even so, I've never met him before. He probably has no idea I even exist beyond our initial encounter. Why would he want anything to do with an elderly man such as myself?"

"If it is possible, Tendo… You'd probably be the first person he could believe in that wouldn't hurt him that happens to be an adult, something we both have issues with. I trust you. Maybe he can, too."

"But that would mean I would have to accept the possibility of something else that has been a very large disgrace that has been weighing heavily on my past."

"Which is?"

"The possibility that we're both related to a monster that brings nothing but grief."

Rumiko had to accept that, as well.

"I won't pressure you into the possibility," she assured him. "All I ask is that you think about it."

"Okay," he agreed with her, and she got up and retired to her room. "Shinji Ikari sounds like someone that has spent everyday of his life knowing nothing but suffering with very few pleasures. How does anyone endure it all?"

"Like me, he devotes what time he has to someone that gives him purpose," Rumiko answered him, and then closed her door.

-x-

Shado stepped out of the women's bathroom after using the toilet and washing her hands (which was difficult, due to her size and the lack of a stool or ladder), but hesitated from walking away a bit after seeing the purple-haired woman from before and the woman with the yellow hair…and the girl with the blue hair and red eyes, standing a few feet away from the restroom.

"Gah," she shuddered at the sight of them before walking away to return to her father's hospital room before he awoke from his slumber.

"Uh, Shado?" She heard one of them, the purple-haired one, speak to her, and she sped up. "Uh, wait, I just want to ask you something!"

Then, frightened by her, Shado ran as fast as her legs could take her and returned to her father's room and cowered under the medical bed.

"Shado, please, I just want to talk with you," Misato tried to clarify, not seeing that she was terrifying the girl.

Shinji was still asleep in the chair by the window, oblivious to what was happening just several feet away from him.

"Did you and Shinji see an elderly man the other day?" Misato asked her, looking under the bed and seeing her there. "He was probably a lot older than me?"

Shado saw her reach out to her with her right hand, and freaked out.

"Daddy!" She cried.

Suddenly, Misato was yanked away…by Shinji, who looked angry.

"What do you think you're doing with her?" He demanded, ignoring the fact that his chest was now looking red under his bandages.

"Shinji, I…" Misato was unable to explain when Shinji grabbed her by her red coat and yanked her up to her feet, blood flowing out of his mouth.

"Speak up! What were you doing?!" He demanded, and she was now terrified because of his grip on her.

She couldn't say anything. She couldn't even look at him.

Shinji then threw her aside out of the room, onto the floor.

"I see you anywhere near her again," he threatened her, now panting, "I'll break your fingers."

He then fell to palms and knees, never taking his eyes off her.

-x-

"…Well, neither one's going to be talking now," Ritsuko told Misato, as Shinji was getting re-bandaged after his original ones got soaked in blood from the stress he got from earlier because of the perceived threat he believed his daughter to be under because of Misato. "He actually threw you out of the room?"

"Yeah, and the worst part of it was that he actually frightened me," Misato told her; she left out how the damaged boy nearly made her soil herself. "Despite his injury, he was absolutely intimidating. And all because a little girl screamed for her father."

Inside the room, as he was being re-bandaged, Shinji's daughter sat in the chair by the window, watching him as the male nurses disposed of his blood-soaked bandages. This was the fifth time she had been kept safe from possible harm by her father. First, it was the woman that tried to make her get into an oven, then the boy that was his cousin, then the Angel they saw when they first arrived in Tokyo-3, followed a stray dog, and now the purple-haired woman.

Cough! She heard him cough, and saw the male nurse on his left back away, covered in red splotches that had to be her father's blood.

 _Daddy,_ she feared.

-x-

"…Well, because of the stress he was under when he saw Captain Katsuragi near his daughter, he might require heart surgery," a male doctor explained to Ritsuko and Misato later that afternoon. "One of the male nurses claims that he coughed up almost two pints of blood. Also, he might need a skin graft, as well."

"Really?" Misato asked him.

"I had to look at the area where he was bleeding through his bandages. The flesh looked completely raw. And you say he was kidnapped over five years ago and they just decided to cut his skin off in the shape of a five-pointed star? You have to be a goddamn sadist of the worst kind to do that to a child, not just commit rape on them."

"Where is he now?" Ritsuko asked him.

"He took his daughter and left out to the garden area."

"By himself?" Misato questioned.

"I believe a girl with red hair attempted to follow them."

Misato then ran off to the garden area; Shinji might've cast her aside just for trying to question his daughter, but she didn't need to see Asuka experience a similar repercussion because of her ego or because she wanted to see what he would do to her. Worst, she could've caused Shinji even further pain that his body may not be able to put up with.

 _And if he dies, who will be left to take care of his daughter?_ She thought, running into an elevator, ignoring Kaji as she unknowingly shoved him out of her way. _If he dies, she won't have anyone_ _…_ _and it'll be our fault._

Once she made it to the floor the garden was accessible on, she ran out…and saw Asuka, nursing her left wrist as she walked her way.

"Asuka? What happened?" She asked her.

Asuka looked up at her and said, "Some girl with a little boy came over and told me to leave the Third Child and his little brat alone."

"Where are they right now?"

"In the garden. That…that boy looked like he rather be with someone like her than in my presence. She didn't even look all that attractive."

Deciding to disregard her ego, Misato ran past her and outside the building, entering a large, artificial garden with small walkways and indents full of water flowing away from a large fountain. Several feet away from the fountain was a large tree and a gazebo…where she could see four people (two male, two female) laying on their backs.

"If you're going to go over there and bother them, lady, I suggest you don't," she heard a man's voice say to her, and she turned to her right, seeing an elderly man with a cane sitting on a small bench. "A young vixen with red hair made that mistake until my employee sent her away."

"Your employee? You mean, the girl with the little boy?"

"That's right. This is time that should be spent on two young, single parents and their children, not people bothering other people for petty reasons. The young man already seems to be in bad shape because of whatever it is that he does that doesn't agree with him. He doesn't need more stress than he already has."

"I'm sorry, but who are you, exactly? Do you have a permit to be here?" Misato questioned him.

"Where are my manners? My name is Tendo Rokubungi. I'm just a simple tea shop owner that was invited by his teenage mother of an employee after she received a call from the young man's daughter to come back and see him. I'm just minding my business while watching them from a relative distance."

Tendo turned to face her and made it no hint that he believed that she should either turn away or sit down.

"Who are you?" He asked her.

"Captain Misato Katsurgai of NERV," she answered him.

"Katsuragi? As in Dr. Shinichi Katsurgai?"

Misato turned to face him directly, surprised by his question.

"You knew him?" She asked.

"Met him a handful of times," he answered. "I take it you're a relative of his?"

"He was my father."

"Oh? He never mentioned having any family. Only talked about his work every time I brought him his tea and pastries. Whatever happened to him?"

"He's dead. Died fifteen years ago."

"I'd offer you my sympathy, but something tells you don't need any."

"Much appreciated."

They then returned their gaze to the four kids in the gazebo.

Shinji, rising up momentarily to stretch his arms, looked and saw Misato. He clutched his chest with his right hand before trying to get up, but Rumiko stopped him from doing so.

"I take it your status as a captain means you have some association with my employee's friend?" Tendo asked her.

"Sort of," Misato explained, seeing Shinji lay back down to stay in the shade.

"He's damaged, you know. The more stress you put on him, the more he will break from the pressure. You do that to a young man as maimed as this one…and you might as well dig his grave for him."

"You talk as if we're killing him," she accused him.

"Well, what are you doing to him, exactly?"

"I'm afraid that's classified information."

"Bull."

"Plus, he threw me out of his room just for trying to ask his daughter a question."

"And I'm sure he had every right to feel that his daughter was being harmed by someone he didn't know or trust. What exactly was the question, Ms. Katsuragi?"

"If either of them had met an elderly man."

"That's no question. There are a lot of elderly men around the city."

"Well, the commander of this agency wanted to know if they met one that owned a tea shop."

Tendo then sighed and got up off the bench.

"I'm the only elder within this entire city that owns a tea shop," he told her. "Now, I feel I need to have words with your superior to ascertain whatever this is about."

To be continued…

A/N: Uh-oh! Comments are welcomed! I want to hear from you what you think is what now!


	10. Distant Agony

Creation began on 10-09-16

Creation ended on 10-18-16

Neon Genesis Evangelion

Different from You: Distant Agony

"…Captain Katsuragi is on her way here with a man that has requested upon seeing you, Ikari," went Fuyutsuki to Gendo in his office. "It's the one that owns the tea shop."

Gendo just frowned. They might as well have settled this right now.

The door to his office opened up and Misato stepped inside, followed by the tea shop owner.

"Gentlemen," she greeted them and then stood aside to introduce the third man, "this is Tendo Rokubungi. He's the one you requested upon knowing about."

Tendo looked at Fuyutsuki, and then bowed his head. Then, he looked at Gendo…and soon wished he hadn't at all.

"You," he uttered.

"You," Gendo responded, removing his glasses from his face.

Tendo walked over until he was three feet from Gendo.

"Your people have been harassing one of my employees, and for what? If you want to satisfy your displaced curiosity, you come to me, not harass them!" Tendo told him.

"Still the same, are you?" Gendo expressed, unfazed by Tendo's raised voice.

"I thought you dead for years," Tendo told him.

"Same here," he responded. "Did you mourn?"

"Did you?"

"Never."

"Well, there's your answer. I mourned the loss of family and friends, but not you. You were undeserving of any mourning."

Misato and Fuyutsuki were puzzled at what was going on. Did these two men…know each other?

"Still hard to comprehend," went Tendo to Gendo, "that this is just how far my little brother has fallen over the years."

"Excuse me?!" Misato gasped.

"Same here," added Fuyutsuki, taken aback by this discovery. "You two are brothers?"

Tendo turned back to face them.

"Sadly, we are," he answered. "I'm guessing you can't see the resemblance, however minor. I am ten years his superior."

"You haven't been my brother for a long time, Tendo," Gendo retorted.

"You might've been cast out, but blood still runs thicker than water, no matter how much we both wish it didn't. Don't forget, it was your fault you were disowned."

"Something neither of you never could forgive me for."

Misato and Fuyutsuki looked at one another; there was clearly some bad history between these two brothers that was never resolved.

"We couldn't forgive you, Gendo," Tendo expressed. "You were beyond forgiveness. You lacked the capacity for forgiveness. You still lack it."

"And he left you everything because of it? They always favored you." Gendo responded.

"That…is where you were always wrong, brother. There was no favoritism at all. It was always what you believed. Our parents loved us equally, you just couldn't see that."

 _Sibling rivalry?_ Misato wondered.

"You wanted to be the favorite when there was no favorite, so you joined a small street gang," went Tendo some more, "and one night, it got out of hand…and you brought your mess back home with you…or have you forgotten that day?"

"That was an accident!" Gendo yelled.

"It was still your fault!" Tendo retorted. "You brought your mess home with you, and our mother died because of you!"

-x-

"…You know, if it weren't for the fact that we're underground, I would say that this garden here is quite peaceful," said Rumiko to Shinji, who seemed out cold right now as they were laying under the gazebo shade. "Shinji?"

With Shado laying beside him, the young father seemed to be almost asleep.

"Shado, is he asleep?" Rumiko asked her.

The little girl looked at her father and placed her left hand on his chest.

"I can't feel anything because of the bandages," she told her.

Rumiko then placed her right hand against his neck; all she could feel was a faint pulse.

"Good grief," she sighed.

"Hmm…" They all heard Shinji mumble.

He opened his eyes and got up to a sitting position.

"How long was I out?" He asked them.

"Just a few minutes, perhaps," went Toya.

Shinji then raised his right hand to his chest.

"Daddy?" Shado asked. "Are you okay?"

"Yes, I'm okay, Shado," he told her.

Yet it seemed like he was lying to her. He couldn't tell for sure, but he felt like every time he got into the Eva, he lost a little more of himself to a monster he hated just as much as he hated his relatives and the woman that had Shado and died in prison. Like…he lost more time to spend with those that actually mattered to him because it was being siphoned by something that he had no faith in.

-x-

As Tendo walked out of Gendo's office after divulging to Ms. Katsuragi and Mr. Fuyutsuki the crime that got his brother cast out of the family, Gendo was fuming over his reignited hatred towards his elder brother, demanding to be left alone until later.

Misato, who wished she could've pitied Gendo because of what Tendo revealed, instead pitied Shinji and Shado. To know that they were related to a man that had once been in a gang and was the indirect cause of a woman getting killed and then getting cast aside for his crime. And to know that Gendo was such a…an inconsiderable person, unwilling to admit that it was his fault his mother was killed.

"Mister Rokubungi," she called out to Tendo as he walked towards the elevators. "Weren't you a little…intense with him?"

"Nowhere near as intense as I'd like to be with him," he responded. "You know what the worst part is of knowing that he's alive?"

She nodded in the negative, but had a feeling that the worst part was very bad.

"I find out he's alive, I find out he has a family…or maybe had a family is the appropriate term to use in his case, and he's as rotten to them as he can be towards anyone else when and if he doesn't get his way. My heart goes out to Shinji and Shado, the same as Rumiko and Toya, having to be related to adults that hurt them in excess and where there can be no middle ground to repair strained relationships. I can only hope those four don't get killed because of them."

"Why would you think their relatives would do something to get them killed?" Misato asked him.

Tendo looked at her and explained, "I've been around people long enough to understand they have a cold, dark side when it comes to family. And I've listened to Rumiko's point of view about her past, about how she was taken advantage of because she didn't know any better when she was little. And based on what she confided in me about Shinji, who I can no longer doubt is my nephew, and how his other relatives treat him and his daughter, it's only a matter of time…and tolerance…or the complete lack thereof, before something worse than what happened to them happens to them, whether it's being sent back to their relatives against their will…or they decide to not bother with them through moral channels and just have them disposed of."

Ding. The elevator opened and Tendo stepped into it.

"It's only my advice, but don't trust Gendo as far as you can tolerate him," he told Misato. "Unless he gets his way, no good can come from associating with him."

The door closed and Misato left to return to Central Dogma.

 _Something tells me that something worse is going to happen,_ she thought.

-x-

"…So…you think he's related to someone that works here?" Shinji asked Rumiko as they took their children and left the garden. "Who, exactly?"

"It's only a suspicion," she claimed, not wanting to get anyone's hopes up for nothing, "but it's just some guy that from one of his old photographs. It might not be true, even."

Shinji sighed and expressed, "Well, should your boss ever meet the guy, I hope there's ground to build their relationship."

When they reached the elevators, one of them opened up and out came Tendo, who seemed to be recovering from slight irritation or anger.

"Sir," Shinji greeted, bowing his head to him.

"I was…just on my way to see you all," Tendo expressed, bowing his head back. "It feels like a maze around here. How does one keep from going crazy walking into identical halls?"

"Retracing one's steps," Shinji suggested.

"So…where to?" Shado, on her father's back, asked.

-x-

Although neither Misato or Fuyutsuki said anything, the discovery spread like wildfire around NERV HQ the very next day. The personnel couldn't believe that Commander Ikari had an elder brother…or that he had done something to get their mother killed and himself cast out of their family in the aftermath. It was so extreme that even Ritsuko Akagi had a hard time looking at Gendo without wanting to know his history before Second Impact.

"…It's insane…"

"…You couldn't tell if they were brothers…"

"…Commander Ikari got their mother killed…"

"…It's the same as what I heard about his wife…"

"…The elder brother owns a tea shop…"

"…The teen mother the Third Child converses with is one of his employees…"

The rumors and scattered information went around for hours, and Gendo was most displeased by the talk his brother was getting. The only downside to the rumors were that, despite their presence, neither Shinji or Shado heard anything about Gendo's relation to an older man.

"Well, it seems obvious where your brother stands," went Fuyutsuki to him later that day.

"I was better off believing him dead," the cold man expressed.

"Somehow, I think the both of you were better off believing the other was dead. But, perhaps, this is fate's way of helping your son and his daughter, not you."

"If this is fate, it is irrelevant to the scenario."

Ring-ring-ring! Gendo's desk phone rang, and he picked it up.

"What is it?" He demanded.

-x-

Once it was thoroughly confirmed that he would require heart surgery after the mishap with the woman that claimed to be his commanding officer (like that actually meant anything to him), Shinji, once he had put his daughter down for her afternoon nap, looked at his chest again and grimaced at the scar that now looked like it was one, big scab.

"God," he groaned, redressing the area he undid before it bled again or something worse.

Knock, knock, knock! A knocking came at the door to the room, and Shinji came out of the bathroom to make sure Shado hadn't been awoken by the noise.

She was on his hospital cot and started stirring a little.

He rushed over to the door and opened it to see the faux-blond woman that bothered him just as any other adult woman did just by being near him.

"What do you want?" He asked, trying not to strain his heart or raise his voice like before, but clutching his chest with his right hand as his breathing became slightly ragged.

"There's another Angel," she explained to him.

"Wasn't I suspended from duty because of the last time I faced one?"

Unknown to either of them, Shado mumbled and awoke from her mild slumber, and she heard the faux-blond say to her father, "I'm afraid that this new Angel is so massive, it's going to require all three pilots and Evangelions to deal with it. That means you have to get back into Unit-01."

"How long?" She heard her father ask her.

"An hour, maybe less."

"Give me ten minutes."

Just from the sound of his voice, Shado felt like her father was in more pain than he displayed.

-x-

The entire city was ordered to evacuate because of some sort of situation, but not many of the people could leave on account of the so-called situation being so sudden. Even Tendo couldn't leave his shop or home with the streets crowded with many cars going in one direction.

"I'm surprised that anyone bothered to come in today," he sighed, cleaning the tabletops.

"Some of us don't have anywhere else to go," said a nineteen-year-old man to the elder that employed him as he refilled the sugar bowls with packets.

"While I'd like to be away from the danger of whatever this situation is," a woman of twenty-three years confessed, "I wouldn't mind having a cup of jasmine tea if I died today."

Sweeping up the dust on the floor, Rumiko heard her say this and had to think about how she would've spent her final hours. As bad as it seemed, she would've wanted to go out being held by someone that loved her for her, and not because of any lustful or depraved reasons. And as odd as it seemed delusional, she wouldn't have minded if that someone had been Shinji.

"Despite the late update of the danger, I thank everyone for coming in today," Tendo told everyone.

-x-

"…So far, it looks like the safety dampeners in Unit-01 are doing their job," went Maya to Ritsuko as they monitored Shinji's vitals and synchronization. "He's holding steadily at ninety percent."

"Where are we on the Angel?" Misato asked, looking at the holographics that displayed the large terrain of possible spots where the Angel could have fallen to ensure that it took out a large portion of the Japanese archipelago, even if it missed its target.

"Still in orbit," responded Shigeru to her.

Also on the screens were Units-00, 01 and 02, positioned as far apart from each other as possible to cover the locations the Angel could have chosen.

"This is ridiculous, though," Shigeru stated his opinion. "They haven't even had much simulation training to learn cooperation tactics. How can we expect any of them to actually work together?"

"It looks like we can't, really?" Hyuga expressed. "The boy doesn't seem to get along at all with Rei or Asuka. In fact, he seems to rather be with that other girl than either of them."

"If it means protecting his daughter," went Misato, shuddering at the memory of Shinji throwing her aside, "he'll put up with Asuka and Rei until the Angel is dealt with."

-x-

It was a short time till the conflict between the Evas and the Angel, but a long time to wait and see what would happen.

Shinji hated it. He'd rather be with Rumiko and their kids than be here in the plug. Plus, he was not feeling so good…and hadn't been since the last time he was in the Eva. Looking up at the sky where the Angel hid in the cover of the blue, he and the other girls waited for the sign to strike.

"Say, Third, I heard somewhere that you needed heart surgery," he heard the redhead say to him over the intercom. "Is that true?"

He didn't want to talk to her or the Ayanami girl that his father seemed to favor, and switched off the intercom system.

-x-

"Unit-01's intercom system has been switched off internally," Maya informed Misato and Ritsuko, unable to turn the system back on.

"Did Asuka really have to ask him that?" Misato uttered; with Shinji's communications turned off, the boy would have to rely on sight to know when the Angel decided to come down with the total sum of its explosive mass.

"I thought he already had surgery," went Hyuga to Misato.

"No, he just got his chest redressed with new bandages," she told him.

BLARE! The alarms went off as the Angel now began its descent from space.

"Oh, no," Shigeru gasped, calculating the Angel's trajectory. "The Angel's estimated interception point appears to be where Unit-01 is currently stationed!"

"The Angel's heading for Unit-01?!" Ritsuko questioned, wondering how intelligent this Angel truly was to be targeting an Evangelion.

"Asuka, Rei," Misato ordered, "intercept and backup Unit-01!"

-x-

The sky turned red, as if it had been set ablaze after being laced with combustible chemicals, and Rumiko held onto her son as they hid under one of the tables.

"Are we going to die, Mommy?" Toya asked her.

"I'm not sure, sweetie," she responded.

-x-

Shinji looked up and saw the Angel, which looked like a giant blob with eyeballs, and saw it headings towards him. He spread Unit-01's AT-Field and felt like someone was trying to flatten him with a large piece of wood.

"Aaaaurgh!" He groaned.

SLAM! The Angel slammed against the AT-Field and forced Unit-01 at least one feet into the ground with its immense force.

The Angel then applied more force, causing their AT-Fields to spark and send out electrical discharges and streams of fire that shot out at random spots.

"Aaaaaurgh! Aaaurgh!" Shinji yelled out, feeling like his insides were boiling, and all he saw when he looked up at the Angel as he raised Unit-01's arms up to try and keep the damn thing from putting him down for good were his father and rapist, all over again.

 _Stop,_ he thought, feeling like he was going to choke. _Stop haunting me… Stop hurting us both… YOU TWO ARE THE WORST OF THE PEOPLE THAT HAVE HURT ME, AND YOU WILL NOT GET MY SHADO! DO YOU HEAR ME?!_

A pair of cuts appeared on his facial cheeks as the LCL around him heated up.

-x-

"This can't be right," went Maya to Ritsuko, looking at Shinji's synchronization ratio. "Shinji's synchronization with Unit-01 is rising to three-hundred percent."

"What did you say?" Misato gasped, just as Units-00 and 02 arrived to assist Unit-01. "What about the installed dampers or inhibitors to keep him under control!"

"They should be working," Ritsuko explained. "What about the inhibitors, Maya?"

"I'm checking, checking," the tomboyish girl responded, looking at the recently-installed safety inhibitors to keep Shinji's synchronization at a stable level. "They're active, but they're not doing anything to reduce the synchronization, anymore!"

"What is this kid?" Hyuga questioned, just as Unit-00 used its Progressive Knife in tandem with its AT-Field to cut an opening in the Angel's AT-Field. "It's like every time he goes up against an Angel, his synchronization goes passed eleven!"

"This is getting bad! His vitals are in the red! He can't endure this!" Shigeru informed them.

Ritsuko checked the vitals and found most of the red centered around his nervous system, respiratory system and cardiovascular system, like they were on the verge of overheating. And with his synchronization over three-hundred percent now (it was now rising to three-hundred-fifteen), there was no telling what could happen to him if this continued.

"Shut it down," she told Maya.

"Doctor Akagi?" She questioned, confused.

"Disconnect his nerve connections now," she clarified. "Shut Unit-01 down."

"Delay that order," went Gendo, which disturbed everyone that heard him say that.

"Ikari," said Fuyutsuki to him, "your son is in danger."

But Gendo didn't care about the danger Shinji was in; so long as the Angel was defeated, it was a risk he was willing to take and a price he was willing to pay to get closer to his goal.

On the screens and holographic displays, Unit-02 used its Progressive Knife and stabbed the Angel in its eye, right where its core was located.

Flash! The Angel seemed to self-destruct, causing an explosion.

Misato shielded her eyes from the flash, and when it lessened, she saw the result of the Angel's attempted kamikaze assault: All three Evas looked unscathed, but at least three feet of the ground around them was scorched.

"What's the status of the pilots?" She asked Hyuga.

"We're getting good vitals from Rei and Asuka…but…" He started, but didn't finish.

"What about Shinji?" She questioned, concerned.

"We're not getting any telemetry from inside the plug," he stated, "probably from internal damage caused by the explosion."

"What about video?" Fuyutsuki suggested.

"Internal cameras are also damaged," answered Shigeru, unable to access the internal cameras inside the Unit-01 Entry Plug. "We're completely cut off from the pilot."

"Rei, Asuka," Misato went, unsure of what was going on with Shinji inside the plug, "we've lost contact with Shinji. Bring Unit-01 back to base, immediately."

-x-

Shado awoke from her extended nap and found herself alone in the room her father left her in.

 _Daddy, where are you?_ She wondered, slowly climbing out of the medical cot. _You didn't seem alright before you got back in that monster the last time._

She opened the door and stepped out of the room, entering the hallway. It was empty, quiet, like she was the only one around. She didn't like this, it made her uncomfortable, just as much as she felt uncomfortable around people she didn't know or her father didn't trust around her, like the purple-haired woman or the two girls he had to put up with.

"Hello?" She called out, hoping someone was around, particularly an adult that didn't want to ask her personal questions or wasn't someone her father disliked. "Hello? I'm looking for my Daddy."

-x-

The immobile Unit-01 seemed like a statue, only made of metal and plastic over the flesh and bone. It was like a demon that watched the city with a hidden hatred.

"Stupid idiot," said Asuka, about to move the incapacitated Eva.

Unknown to either Unit-00 or Unit-02, Unit-01's right hand closed into a fist.

SLAM! Unit-01 then turned and struck Unit-00 in its head, knocking it aside in front of Unit-02.

"Hey! What's the big idea, Third?!" Asuka demanded as the purple Eva turned around.

"Asuka, get back!" Misato gasped.

Unit-01's eyes, which should've been a whitish-yellow, were instead a dark shade of red.

"Grr," it growled, and a red substance salivated from its mouth.

"What's going on here?" Asuka demanded.

"Unit-01's gone berserk," Misato explained.

"How long until it runs out of power?"

"We don't know if it will run out of power. You have to remove the plug from the Eva."

Asuka made Unit-02 charge at Unit-01 (after checking her power regulator and seeing only three minutes left in the reserves), and slammed it against the side of the hill where it had been when the Angel attacked.

"Unit-00 coming to assist," she heard one of the technicians say over the intercom, and saw the orange prototype approaching.

Rei reached out for the purple Eva's back armor while Asuka held it down, but then Unit-01 found a way to throw Unit-02 off of it and at Unit-00, sending both to the ground.

SLAM! It stomped on Unit-00's left leg, sending painful nerve signals to the blue-haired pilot.

SLAM! It then stomped on Unit-02's right arm, sending painful nerve signals to its redhead pilot.

"Aaaahh!" Both girl reacted in agony, and the Central Dogma bridge crew were doing their best to reduce the feedback.

"Grrr! Grrrraah!" Unit-01 growled, and then walked away from the fallen Evas, leaving the city limits.

-x-

"I don't believe this," went Misato as Unit-01 left the two Evas after crippling them. "Where is it going?"

"We don't know," responded Shigeru.

"What about the pilot?"

"We're still not picking up anything from inside the plug, not even a heartbeat," said Hyuga.

"Any estimation into how long until it stops?"

"The Eva's power reserves say two minutes, but it's frozen," explained Maya. "God help us all."

 _God help us all, indeed,_ thought Misato; with two of their Evas damaged and the third running amok, it was anyone's guess as to what Unit-01 was going to do, if it ever did anything beyond walking away from the city.

-x-

Drivers honked their car horns, passengers raised their voices, and dogs and cats barked and hissed at the sight of the purple giant as it made its presence known. Some thought it was a robot being tested. A few thought it was an experiment gone awry. Most thought of it as some sort of monster.

Unit-01 just walked on down the path it took, away from the roads and buildings.

-x-

"…That was from the JSSDF," said Fuyutsuki to Gendo after the military got wind of the situation. "They suspect that Unit-01 is heading towards Mt. Fuji."

"Mount Fuji?" Ritsuko questioned. "But why would it go there?"

"That's anyone's guess," Fuyutsuki told her.

"Has anyone tried questioning the Third Child's daughter?" Gendo questioned, which made the two people in front of him concerned about the actual reason behind the question.

"Nobody wants to go near the little girl, sir," Ritsuko revealed, "not after Captain Katsuragi's attempt to question her about your brother and the Third Child's minor assault and threat on her if she tried to do so again."

"Ikari," Fuyutsuki uttered, "we may have to consider the possibility that this is because the pilot was in danger from the high synchronization…and we did nothing to undo it when the situation presented itself to us."

"The Angel needed to be dealt with first," Gendo countered.

"But at the expense of the pilot? At the expense of a little girl's father?"

Gendo didn't answer him.

-x-

Because nobody would tell her where her father was and because she was feeling lonely, Shado called the number that Toya's mother gave her father, hoping that they were still around the city. That had been around almost half an hour ago, and she was still waiting in the room her father had been in before he left to deal with another monster that these people made him face.

"Shado?" She heard someone say her name outside the room, and she turned to face them.

It was Rumiko and Toya.

"Thank you," she praised them for coming.

"So, nobody's saying anything about Shinji?" Rumiko asked her, setting Toya down on the medical cot beside her on the left.

"No, nothing," she responded. "It's not like Daddy to be gone this long, and he was really hurt when they made him go off and face another monster."

"Your father was in bad condition?" Toya asked her. "How bad?"

"He wouldn't show it, but I could tell that his chest hurt."

"Like the bruise there was more painful than before?" Rumiko asked.

"Yes. What if…they're not saying anything about him…because…"

"Hey, hey," Rumiko stopped her there and picked her up, setting her on her lap. "We don't know for sure. We don't know if they even know anything. Maybe there's still a monster out there, or they're just playing doctor on him to treat his chest pains."

She then turned around to look at the door and saw the purple-haired woman that Shinji informed her of that frightened Shado, and she walked away.

"Toya, watch Shado," she instructed her son. "I have to powder someone's nose."

"Yes, Mommy," her son obliged, and she stepped right out of the room.

Misato walked faster until she felt a hand grab her by her right wrist.

"You know something, don't you?" She heard the teen girl's voice. "About whatever it is that happened to Shinji, don't you?"

She turned to face her and said, "Even if I did, I couldn't tell you. It's classified and need-to-know only, and you're not affiliated with NERV."

"Oh, really? Need-to-know only? Well, I need to know!" Rumiko raised her voice. "Why I need to know? Because Shado's the only girl here that's concerned about a young man's life. You might still be on the ass-end of being throttled and tossed aside by Shinji, but I don't really give a damn about that. I would've done the exact same thing to you if you tried to speak to my son without my say-so. Now, what has happened to Shinji?"

"Look, I can't tell you anything…" Misato tried to get her to stand aside.

"You tell me!" She demanded. "Or St. Jude help me, Shinji won't be the only one who threatened to break your fingers."

Misato could've raised her other hand to throttle her, but the moment she turned around to face her completely, she saw the two children behind Rumiko.

"I'd tell her if I were you," the boy told her, holding Shado's left hand. "I've seen her punch through glass a few times to know she doesn't joke."

-x-

"…You told a civilian classified information?" Ritsuko questioned Misato, watching Rumiko in the gazebo with Shado and Toya.

"She was most persuasive," Misato defended her excuse. "A single mother with an attitude is not to be trifled with."

"Not even a pilot candidate, and you told her what she wanted to know about the Third Child."

"It wasn't just for herself. She wanted to know for Shado because nobody would tell her what happened to her father."

In the gazebo, Rumiko held onto her son and Shado on her lap while hoping to lift her spirits after discovering that Shinji was still inside the Eva due to a "technical malfunction". In total honesty, she didn't believe any of that crud the purple-haired woman tried to sell her on; she had seen _The Avengers_ and believed that people capable of lying so much to keep their secrets by hiding them with false secrets or, in the words of Tony Stark, _"Secrets have secrets."_ In the end, there was nothing worse than being lied to about someone you cared about and not knowing what was really wrong with them.

"Do you think Daddy's alright?" Shado asked her.

"I'm sure he's doing fine," she answered, but she felt like she had lied to her.

"Probably being seen by a doctor right now," added Toya.

Shado appreciated their concerns for her father. If only she knew what was going on with him.

-x-

Unit-01 had climbed the top of Mt. Fuji as the sun started to set. And then fell to its palms and knees, bowing its head, powering down. The armor on the back of its body detached and the Entry Plug protruded from within the Eva, spraying out LCL.

-x-

"…That was from Mt. Fuji," Fuyutsuki informed Gendo. "They retrieved Unit-01 and the pilot and are bringing them back."

"Good," Gendo responded.

"Not entirely," the Sub-Commander explained. "Upon extracting the pilot, the retrieval team found several new injuries on his body, none of which they're certain were self-inflicted. This includes two cuts on his face that start under his eyes and end at his cheeks just above his mouth."

"The high synchronization is causing serious injury to him, regardless of the safeties installed," went Ritsuko, unable to come up with a new solution. "We can't keep it at a minimum."

-x-

"…Judging from the extent of his newest injuries and the fact that he was unconscious when he was removed," said a female doctor to Misato as they stood outside of an operating room where Shinji was being worked on, "there's no way he could've made the Eva travel to Mt. Fuji after facing an Angel of that magnitude."

"Can you say for certain?" Misato questioned her.

"Absolutely. He had to have lost consciousness after the Angel was defeated. Everything that occurred afterwards had to have been the Eva's own doing."

Seeing as they were removing his plugsuit, Misato's eyes widened at the sight of Shinji's chest.

"Dear God," she shuddered, covering her mouth.

From what she could see so far, the boy's previous scar had completely blistered, looked like processed bologna and bled while it had expanded to covering his shoulders and to his back.

"Great Caesar's ghost," one of the assistant male doctors gasped, backing away from the boy after removing the top part of the plugsuit. "It's a damn, dark miracle he's still alive."

"This isn't right," the female doctor told Misato. "His chest injury didn't look anything like that before he was in the Eva."

-x-

Although it was suggested that she take her son and leave, Rumiko was adamant in staying with Shado so that she wasn't lonely until her father came back. Even her boss supported her decision to stay until Shinji made a recovery.

"How are we supposed to tell them about his new injuries?" Maya asked Ritsuko, watching the three individuals on the surveillance cameras as they sat in the lobby of the medical ward.

"We're not saying anything until we know for sure what's going on with the Third Child," Ritsuko informed her, going over Shinji's latest medical records. "We might not even tell them anything at all."

On another surveillance camera, a heavily-sedated Shinji was still on the operating table in the O.R. His entire torso bandaged and his face cleaned on the blood that had bled from the cuts.

 _What_ _in God's name is this boy?_ Ritsuko wondered, going over the chart again and being unsure if NERV should even continue exploiting this child.

-x-

GASP! Shinji gasped, awakening from what felt like an eternity of slumber in the darkness, finding himself in a room with surgical equipment.

He felt weak, exhausted and ready for the burial service against his will. Turning to his right side, despite the pain he was in, he managed to get up into a sitting position. The door leading out was right there in front of him, and he wanted to get up. His feet, once on the cold floor, couldn't support his weight and he fell, knocking over a tray of gauze in the process.

"Shado… Rumiko… Toya…" He grunted, now trying to crawl, dragging the right side of his face on the floor.

The door opened and several female nurses came in.

"The Third Child is conscious," said one of them.

"He needs to be sedated again," he heard another one say.

With his left eye, he saw one of them preparing a syringe. Then he saw another reach for his neck.

"There, there, this will help you sleep," he heard a fourth nurse say.

" _There, there, this will help you sleep,"_ he suddenly recalled his rapist say to him once, and she started slapping him on his face.

"NO!" He screamed, and the next thing he knew, he saw one of the nurses falling against a wall.

It was sudden, it was instant, and before he knew it, Shinji was panting as he walked down the hall.

-x-

Shado and Toya were asleep, so Rumiko stepped out of the lobby and tried to find a vending machine somewhere so she could get a canned beverage that could help her stay awake.

Thud! A door in front of her in the hallway opened up and somebody staggered out.

"Shinji?" She gasped, seeing who it was, and he turned to face her. "Oh, dear. Your face."

"Rumi…Rumiko…" Shinji uttered, walking towards her.

He fell to his knees and Rumiko rushed over to him and held him.

"Aaah! Aah!" Shinji hissed. "What…what time is it? What day?"

"It's after midnight," she explained. "It's…it's only been a few hours since you were gone, Shinji."

"They won't stop," she heard him say. "They won't stop."

"What do you mean? Who are you talking about?"

"That man… That woman… My life is a cluster right now because of my awful family and my rapist! All six of them!"

Rumiko just held him and heard him say some things that didn't make any sense because they seemed crazy to comprehend. But she didn't doubt his words because they were both damaged. They were both hurt by people they could no longer trust with their lives. And they couldn't go back to the days before their personal and traumatic experiences warped their perceptions of the world.

It would be a while before security arrived…and it would be a while before Rumiko discovered what Shinji had done before they found each other in the silence of night…and who got hurt by him.

To be continued…


	11. Life or Death

Creation began on 10-18-16

Creation ended on 11-23-16

Neon Genesis Evangelion

Different from You: Life or Death

The nurses sent to deal with Shinji were thrown around the operating room he had been left in, incapacitated due to the boy's unexpected adrenaline rush and panic attack. They and at least three guards were either punched, kicked or shoved out of his way as he made his way through the trauma ward to see three people he could stand to be around.

" _Was anything said to Shinji?"_ Rumiko had questioned Ritsuko upon discovering this. _"Did your nurses say anything that might've unintentionally set him off?"_

 _Even though he's injured, the adrenaline rush numbed him to his pain,_ thought Ritsuko as she examined Shinji while he was sedated after he was assured that nobody was going to do anything to him or his daughter while out cold, and that Rumiko and Toya would be around to keep an eye on Shado until he awoke. _All one of the nurses said before he went off on them was that the sedative would help him sleep._

On her chart was the nurse's statement that said she explained the sedative would help him sleep when they tried to administer it.

-x-

"…Judging from the extent of his injuries, I take it his heart surgery is on hold?" Misato questioned Maya, who had a copy of Shinji's medical records.

"The doctors can't risk operating on him until he's more stable. Physically and mentally." Maya explained to her.

"This is insane. More than that, this is a disaster waiting to get worse."

"It might already be worse than you think, Captain Katsuragi. These are Shinji's synchronization results during the last attack. It nearly hit four-hundred percent."

"Four…four-hundred percent?"

"I did some digging…and something almost like this happened ten years ago. The pilot back then had a four-hundred percent synchronization…and they died."

"Who was it?"

"It was Commander Ikari's wife."

Misato was left unable to comprehend what left NERV to even recruit this damaged young man that was clearly screwed up…and how the insanity he found himself surrounded by seemed to stem partly from his family before his daughter, not just his kidnappers and his rapist.

-x-

Truth be told, many of the personnel felt that the latest injuries the young girl's father got from piloting the Eva was entirely Commander Ikari's fault. Any number of reasons why he didn't have the Eva shut down when it was revealed to be hazardous for his son existed in the form of rumors, ranging from unjustifiable hatred at him to just wanting to get rid of the little girl that was his granddaughter because he didn't want to be bothered with either of them.

But to be honest, Gendo didn't have time to deal with their petty assumptions. Not even when one of the doctors in front of him in his office with Dr. Akagi was going on and on about the Third Child's injuries sustained from the last sortie.

"Given the inability to reduce his synchronization to safer levels, I must recommend that any further use of the Third Child with any of the Evas be suspended indefinitely," a male doctor expressed to Gendo, backed up by two other male doctors.

"In layman's terms?" Fuyutsuki, who was also in the office, asked them.

"We need to cut the boy lose," went Ritsuko, clarifying their claims. "Period."

Hearing that, however, made Gendo say that there was no time to find a suitable replacement for the Third Child and that he would stay on the combat roster until further notice.

"Sir, given the severity of his synchronization-related injuries, he shouldn't be anywhere near the Eva," a second male doctor urged Gendo to reconsider.

"What he means is that the boy's now living on borrowed time because of the last sortie," the third doctor revealed. "The next time he gets into the Eva may very well be his last time because it's going to kill him!"

 _What?!_ Fuyutsuki gasped mentally, never anticipating that the Eva would be another person's grave.

-x-

"Urgh," groaned Rumiko as she rubbed her temples as she sat beside Shinji's medical cot.

"Mommy?" She heard Toya's voice as he and Shado were laying on a smaller cot away from Shinji's.

"Uh, yeah, Toya?" She asked him.

"Are you alright?"

"Uh, yeah. Yeah, I'm fine."

"How is he?"

She looked at Shinji again and responded that he was still asleep.

Shinji seemed far from at peace while asleep, though. If anything, he looked like he was ready for the medical examiner. His face, his chest and now parts of his shoulders and back and neck, they were scarred and caused him pain. He didn't tell her much of anything, but Rumiko had to deduce that, after what he told her last night when he showed up after several hours of being gone, operating some giant robot was far more hazardous to Shinji than what might've been suspected or thought possible.

 _He said his life was a cluster because of his family and his rapist,_ she thought, reaching out to his left hand. _He didn't elaborate on what he meant by all six of them, but he excluded Shado from the cluster…and I believe him, everything he says._

Clasp. She felt his hand softly grab onto hers as the open window behind her let in a new breeze.

He opened his eyes again and looked up at her.

"Ow…" He groaned softly.

"Hey," she greeted kindly.

-x-

"…So, because Commander Ikari doesn't want to cut him loose because he claims there's no time to find a replacement pilot," went Misato to Ritsuko an hour later after hearing of another rumor about the repercussions of the last sortie, "he wants to keep Shinji on the combat roster, even after everything he's gone through?!"

"Yes, that's right," the faux-blond explained, using the MAGI to search for a replacement pilot for Shinji right now. "It's not a smart move at all."

"It's a bad move! An ill move! And he was told that the Eva could kill him the next time he gets into it? What the Hell is he thinking?"

"Not really much 'could'. It will kill him if he gets back inside it."

"Is he trying to kill his own son? Maybe make it an accident?"

"That's what some of the personnel believe. But Commander Ikari never really confirms or denies anything, so nobody can say for certain."

"If there is any truth to that possibility, what happens to the boy's daughter if something happens to him? It's obvious that his father has no interest in his granddaughter and it's obvious that the reverse is also true; the girl doesn't see her grandfather in a positive way."

"Maybe try to recruit the girl to pilot the Eva."

"You say something like that again, and I'll bust your mouth, Rits."

As they continued to work in Central Dogma, down in the medical ward, Rumiko was helping Shinji walk out of the room and towards an elevator.

The young father, after brief consideration, just wanted to leave the place with his daughter and get medical attention from a regular hospital or clinic. His friend was quick to oblige him, and their kids were on the lookout for anyone that might've hindered them.

"You want to talk about what happened?" Rumiko asked him as they stepped into an elevator.

"Not here," he told her, pressing a button and waiting for the doors to close. "But to make a long story short, there's always a time when one has to say that enough is enough. That's what this is. Enough is enough, and it can't go on."

"I'm glad we're leaving this place," Toya expressed to them. "It seems like nobody wants to explain much of anything about anything."

"Not many people want to tell younger people anything," Shado clarified for him.

When the elevator stopped, the doors opened and revealed the same guy with the unshaven face and ponytail that Shinji and Shado had seen before when the redhead showed up.

"Oh, hey, there, you kids," Kaji greeted them, but none of them spoke back.

They just stepped out of the elevator and walked past him.

-x-

"How will you explain this to the Committee, Ikari?" Fuyutsuki asked the cold man, referring to the fact that if the Third Child got inside the Eva again, it would kill him.

"There's nothing to explain," Gendo responded. "There's no definite proof that the Third Child's life is in any danger."

"Ikari, you know that isn't true. The majority of the personnel are concerned that you may be trying to have your son killed."

"To ensure the Angels are defeated, sacrifices must be made."

"They're going to demand some type of explanation as to why one of the pilots is physically deteriorating every time they pilot the Eva with a high synchronization ratio."

Before Gendo could express that this wasn't something SEELE needed to know about at all, the desk phone rang and he answered it.

"Yes?" He questioned. "When was this?"

-x-

Maybe he was crazy for doing this, but Shinji felt it was better. He couldn't trust his father to try something to cause him and Shado further misfortune.

It was fortunate that Rumiko knew about a free clinic in the city that could do heart surgery with absolute discretion; she says that it was because of Tendo's prior knowledge of the city's lesser-known sources of aid that she was able to get painkillers for her back injury.

"I'm surprised that such a place exists," said Shado, waiting with Rumiko and Toya while Shinji was being operated on.

The door suddenly opened and a male surgeon stepped out to see them; they were the only ones around the clinic, so it wasn't a long wait.

"How is he?" Rumiko asked the surgeon.

He gave a peace sign and answered, "Your boyfriend pulled through the operation with little worry. Patched up his heart and expanded the valves. He should be able to make a complete recovery in about two days or so. Can't say the same for his chest, though, unless he has a lot of skin cream."

"Which I can't get yet without a prescription," they heard Shinji say as he stepped out of the operating room, covering his freshly-bandaged torso with the hospital garments he still had from NERV. "Thank you very much for your help."

"You still have some of the anesthesia in you, so you'll need to rest up," the surgeon reminded him, and handed him a prescription for pain-relief skin cream.

-x-

Ring-ring-ring! Tendo's cell phone rang, and he answered.

"Rokubungi residence," he spoke, despite the fact that his phone read as an unknown caller.

"Where's the boy and his brat, Tendo?" He recognized Gendo's voice, not even trying to hide his contempt at speaking to him.

"What are you talking about?" Tendo asked him, pouring himself a cup of green tea.

"The boy and his brat just left the facility with your employee and her brat."

"I still don't know what you're talking about. It's not any of my business where they are, so long as they call me. And why call me, anyway? Up until just the day before, I didn't even know I had a nephew or a grandniece. I still don't know who they are, apart from what my employee tells me. I don't know where they are right now. And even if I did know, it's not like I could really tell you anything."

Before Gendo could even respond, Tendo hung up, not wanting to be bothered by the antics of his little brother that hadn't matured at all since the day their mother was killed. As he sat down at the kitchen table and drank his tea, he thought of Shinji and Shado, of how it seemed like their very lives just didn't seem to mingle well with most people, like his brother. And from what Rumiko divulged to him about his nephew's maternal aunt, uncle and cousin, all Shinji really had when it came to family was just his illegitimate daughter that depended upon him.

 _Those two are victims of people that just don't seem to understand or care about what really happened to them,_ he thought, looking down at his cell phone. _But I trust Rumiko and her sense of judgment. They were both hurt and trust is something that needs to be built upon, which isn't easy. I should know. Rumiko almost ended up turning tricks before I met her and Toya. Now, I just do what I can to keep her from having to go back to that dark path her father and brother took her down._

He felt like it was only the day before when he met the two in his tea shop during the closing hours at night, how he didn't know either of them or their living situation at first. All he really knew back then was how young Rumiko was and how, just after engaging in a simple, friendly conversation with her, everything else that happened just seemed to fall into place.

" _We can't go back to that house,"_ she said cryptically to him. _"Every waking moment with her there could be our last moment with her there. My father and brother are gone, but she's still there, and... I couldn't leave Toya alone with her, so I left everything and everyone."_

 _There's no way I could ever imagine anyone like her resorting to selling her body just to provide for her son. If I hadn't met them, though, that's exactly what she could've done or worse._

Even after she gave him the contact number for her mother's phone and the address of where she used to live, Tendo, instead of trying to convince the girl to return home and hash it out with her mother, decided to be the path of positive resistance for her.

-x-

"…So, this is your room?" Rumiko asked Shinji, helping him into his and Shado's unit after helping the young father get across the city because he was still under the influence of the anesthesia.

"Yeah," he answered her, falling onto his futon and turning over so that he was on his back, not his chest. "I should be able to get up in about an hour to make Shado something to eat."

"Toya and I can stay around so that you can recover from the surgery," she offered; she didn't want to leave either him or his daughter alone after they left NERV.

"I try to refrain from the instant meals. There should be some celery and bamboo in the refrigerator along with some curry."

"I can also make miso soup for you two."

"Thank you."

Meanwhile, in Shado's room, Toya looked out the window at the city that seemed to be moving on after the last attack from a monster that nobody seemed to know about in general.

"I never said this before, but the city always seems like the least likely place that is child friendly," he uttered to Shado, who stepped out from within her closet, dressed in an oversized, blue shirt.

"With the exception of the playgrounds and the tea shop, is there such a city that is child friendly?" She asked him, sitting on her futon.

"Honestly, I always felt the safest of places were either the tea shop or my mother's room."

"Daddy has always been my safe place. His aunt and uncle back at their place before this city were just bad. Real bad."

Ding-dong! The doorbell rang, and both children turned to the hallway leading towards the front door.

Rumiko stepped out of Shinji's room and looked at the front door, quietly gesturing the kids to hide somewhere until the coast was clear for them. Tiptoeing on the floor towards the door, she gazed into the peephole and saw the purple-haired woman that she and Shinji threatened for withholding information and just approaching Shado.

"You might as well give up," Misato uttered. "We know that four of you are in there. You need to have Shinji come back to NERV, immediately."

"What for?" Rumiko asked her.

"Because Commander Ikari says he has to."

"I've heard better excuses. Shinji's asleep right now."

"Then wake him."

"No."

"I'm his commanding officer, and if I have to, I will have you arrested for interfering with a NERV-related matter."

Rumiko raised her right hand up, but didn't unlock the door.

Someone behind her had beaten her to doing that, though she was just going to yell at the woman.

"Rumiko just told you that I'm trying to sleep," went Shinji, who looked as white as a sheet now and intimidating because of his scars under his eyes and on his cheeks. "I'll explain my absence after I've recouped here."

Misato was about to speak up, but Shinji closed the door in her face again.

"Shinji, I…" Rumiko spoke up, but Shinji silenced her with just a raised hand.

"It's all gonna fall on me," he told her. "I asked you to help me get out of that place. You only did as I asked of you, and I thank you."

"How will you explain this all to them, if you don't mind my asking?"

"That enough is enough. I have to live with the promise I made to Shado. If things got bad, if she got hurt or if I got hurt real bad, I'd stop helping everyone at NERV, no matter what they say."

"How do you think that man's going to take this?"

"If he can't accept my decision, then that's his problem. I didn't want to do this to begin with. I only did it to keep Shado safe. Then, I met you and Toya allover again…and I tried to endure the agony of piloting the Eva awhile longer because… I really needed more than one person I care about to want to protect from danger. But every time I faced an Angel, every time I was just inside the Eva…everything just hurt…and I don't want to leave those close to me alone just because some adults I don't care about made something they can't use without using young people."

"Do you think that…they'd try to use me?" Rumiko asked him, curious about how NERV recruited people their age to do what he did.

"Not while your mother's around, that's for certain," he answered her, "and even if she weren't, my last sortie in the Eva gave me an unwavering epiphany that shed light on a web of lies that agency was built on for many years."

If only they had known that three people had heard them speaking.

-x-

"…The fact that he was able to leave the base unnoticed shows that we're slacking in our security, Ikari," said Fuyutsuki to Gendo in the latter's office. "And the fact that he appeared to seek help from another teen parent indicates we know less than we thought we did."

"It's still irrelevant, Fuyutsuki," Gendo countered; no matter what the former teacher of metaphysical biology believed, everything about whatever the Third Child did that didn't help the scenario was to be disregarded entirely.

-x-

"…Daddy, I thought you were supposed to be resting," went Shado to Shinji, who was in the bathroom at the sink, looking like he still needed rest.

"I just needed to clean my face, Shado," he explained to her, turning the faucet off. "Are you alright? Did you eat while I was asleep?"

"Yes. Toya's mother made dinner for us. She just finished cleaning the dishes."

"That's good."

Shado noticed how her father staggered against the wall after stepping away from the sink.

"Daddy, maybe you should…crawl back to your room instead of walking," she suggested.

"No, it's nothing serious, sweetie," he told her, but then saw the look of woe on her face, and sighed in defeat. "Okay, sweetie, you win. I'll crawl back to my room."

He slowly got down onto his arms and knees and she led him back to his room to rest some more.

"I don't think I even want to know how she got you to get back to bed like that," Shinji heard Rumiko say to him some time later.

"Never underestimate the power of the puppy dog pout," he sighed, his left hand over his eyes as he lay on his futon, "or overestimate the resilience of your hardened heart. When your child is more concerned for your health than you are, they end up being victorious over you."

"Yeah, I know that feeling," Rumiko expressed; it had been six months since she last got sick with the flu that she caught from her son when he was sick. "My son got sick and I caught his bug six months ago. Tendo wouldn't even let me leave the house until my fever broke."

"Concerned people."

She then sat on the floor beside his futon.

"So…parents that aren't parents," she uttered, reminding him that his discovery of what was going on and how messed-up his family was. "How did it ever come to this?"

"Depravity and self-righteousness," he revealed; nothing hurt worse than loveless agendas and falsehood beliefs that weren't worth the unforgivable gallons of blood that had been spilt over the years. "I will never forgive them for what they did…for what they want to do…and I can't forgive myself for helping them unknowingly."

Rumiko then lifted his upper body and placed his head on her lap as she sat beneath him.

"I'll forgive you," she told him. "I'll always forgive you."

It was the thirteenth dark thought she had, but Rumiko felt entitled to the feeling of safety she had from the Eva by just being born the day before the day half the world went away. Even Shinji knew she was fortunate enough to be able to avoid the dark and unforgiving hand of cards that those born after Second Impact were dealt by those that decided to deal the cards. But even she didn't wish this cruelty upon Shinji or anyone else, not even that redhead bimbo with an attitude problem or that blue-haired girl that Shinji mentioned about being his father's replacement or something of the sort because he seemed to keep her close.

"So…what happens now?" She asked him.

"Whatever will happen," he answered her. "Fate is cruel to say that something you're either manipulated into doing or you have no idea what it even is as some sort of responsibility or destiny."

"Destiny is just a word. If you want to believe in destiny, listen to music."

-x-

"…What do you mean, he's done with NERV?" Ritsuko asked Misato as the purple-haired woman returned to NERV.

"I'm saying he's done," she explained to the faux-blond. "He won't pilot the Eva again. He actually made a promise to his daughter that when things got bad for either of them, he'd stop, and things have been gotten bad for the boy. Even if he still could, he shouldn't."

"That may be, but Commander Ikari won't let him go."

"It may not be up to him, anymore. Shinji said he couldn't continue being a pawn in his parents' game, and he would tell anyone that would listen to him for less than two minutes if it meant exposing his parents for the monsters they are. I don't know if he's crazy from piloting the Eva with such a high and unstable synchronization ration or if he really had an epiphany after the last attack, but he's dead serious about no longer piloting the Eva."

"Maybe he needs to be reminded of what will happen if he doesn't."

-x-

Not bothering to take a chance with his bandages, Shinji, after a good night's rest with Rumiko, returned to NERV after asking Rumiko to watch Shado until he came back for her.

"Hey, there, Shinji," greeted the unshaven man from the other day to him, but Shinji just ignored him in the hall as he walked past him and the redhead and entered an elevator.

To his disgust, Rei Ayanami was present, but he ignored her, too, pressing the button of his desired floor to get to. The doors closed and the elevator moved up. If there had been music playing, it would've made the time in the confined space a bit more pleasant.

Rei never made a move towards him, and he didn't speak a word to her.

"So, you're resigning," she spoke up; it wasn't even a question.

"It's a death sentence," he responded.

"Do you not have faith in your father's work?"

"Happy to disappoint you, but it's not even his work. He just picked up where someone else left off. Someone just as depraved as he is."

The elevator reached the boy's destination and the doors opened.

"You shouldn't run away from your responsibility," Rei spoke as he stepped out.

"I have a responsibility," he retorted. "It's just not this one…and I don't want to be, nor do I have to be, shackled to the sins of those that came before me, which includes you."

The doors closed before Rei could even respond to that last remark about her being a sin, and Shinji walked towards his father's office.

"Shinji," he looked ahead and saw Misato. "You're back."

"Not for too long, but just as I said I would be," he told her.

Even with all the blood cleaned from his face, Misato felt that his scarring made him look like he was worn out and prematurely withered. Before, he just seemed like a young boy forced into a corner and had to try and grow up for a little girl that nobody else wanted to be bothered with caring for; she had dug a little deeper and found that, despite the little girl being innocent of any wrongdoings that her father's rapist had committed, Shado was constantly stigmatized on both sides, the maternal and paternal, similar to how her father was stigmatized for being a kidnap and rape victim, a teen parent and the son of Gendo Ikari. And then, there was just the way he looked at you; it wasn't with indifference or malice like some sort of criminal or serial killer, just a young man that didn't know who to trust and could only assume that everyone older than him was some sort of stranger out to get him. There was no way to compare the boy to his father at all, even if you tried to.

"You're just going to stop piloting the Eva?" She questioned him.

"Is that a trick question?" He asked back.

"Won't you reconsider?"

"I've considered it all I need to."

"So…you're just going to walk away from all this…knowing that there's still danger…because of a promise you made to your daughter?"

Standing outside Gendo's office, Shinji turned to face her and said, "Everyone will find themselves, sooner or later, having to make choices that others don't agree with, Ms. Katsuragi. If this is the lesser of many evils that exist in the world, then it's a choice I can live with if it keeps my daughter from being an orphan or having to be surrounded by strangers I wouldn't entrust with her safety."

They both stepped into the room and stopped in front of Gendo and Sub-Commander Fuyutsuki.

"Let's cut the bullshit and get right to the reason I'm here," Shinji spoke, which surprised Fuyutsuki. "I'm done with the Eva, NERV and you (he points to Gendo)."

"Unacceptable," Gendo told him.

"That's your problem. You have no authority over me…and I don't want to continue piloting something that's going to kill me the next time I get in it."

"You don't know that."

"I'm not going to risk my life, either way. I have someone more important than some heartless abomination to live for."

"All of mankind is at stake, and you'd run away just to play house for some little girl?"

"If that's how you want to view it, then, yes, I would walk away. You want your precious Eva to continue bending over for you, get someone else to do it for you. I'm already burned out…and what's left of my life will be spent with my daughter. You don't like it, you can kiss your wife's Eva-sized ass because both of you just lost your primary pawn."

That was cold and low, even from Shinji. To just disrespect his mother's memory like that.

"What did you say?" Gendo asked him, his tone that of someone who just felt disrespected.

"You…and Mother…are no better than the creatures you call Angels," Shinji uttered, deciding to reveal the extent of his epiphany. "I remember what happened that day she supposedly died…and I hate her for it. You dare to accuse me of running away when you both did it first and foremost, and you entrusted me to your wife's sister and her family…who viewed me as nothing more than a problem, your problem, and weren't the least concerned when I was kidnapped going to the store for them because the sister told me to go get milk."

 _The records only say that he was kidnapped, but not the reason that led up to it,_ thought Misato.

 _What's going on here?_ Fuyutsuki wondered.

Shinji inhaled as he placed his left hand on her chest, nowhere near recovered from the heart surgery from yesterday, and said, "I would say more on what I found out, but it would be as you believe anything that doesn't make your life easier…and I'm still on the mend. If everything happens as it must, then this should also happen: Turn away from the path of violence and intimidation and just live and be content. I've already stayed longer than intended."

He turned to leave, unknowingly leaving a bloody palm print on Gendo's desk.

"Don't you dare walk away from your responsibility, Third Child!" Gendo shouted at his son, but Shinji just walked out of the office, feeling relieved of a heavy burden that was never his.

 _What happens now, Shinji?_ He wondered to himself as he stepped into the elevator. _What will you do with the time you have left that hasn't been taken from you by your parents? Well, your daughter gets your undivided attention. We'll probably have to relocate elsewhere. One thing at a time, Shinji. One thing at a time._

-x-

"…Even if you disagree with what the medical staff said, Ikari," went Fuyutsuki to Gendo, "your son just said he was done, and he has that little girl to take care."

"What he wants is irrelevant," said Gendo to him, ignoring the bloody hand print on his desk. "We have neither the time nor the personnel to replace him."

"You mean, you don't want him replaced, no matter how much he hates you."

-x-

"…What gives him the right to just walk away from this?!" Asuka asked Kaji.

"He's tired, Asuka," Kaji tried to simplify the young father's reasons for resigning from NERV. "The Eva's consuming so much of his time that he has none for his daughter. She's the only reason he's been here for as long as possible, but his duration was based on a promise he made to his daughter, something he intends on keeping."

"What promise was that?"

They were in the cafeteria eating lunch when they discovered that Shinji was walking out of the agency and the Eva.

"His daughter made him promise that if things got bad for either of them, he would stop piloting. He's burned out, Asuka. He can't continue piloting if it's going to kill him with such instability…and to be honest, he shouldn't continue." Kaji told her.

"He could at least have the decency to reconsider," Asuka retorted. "If anything, he can go down in front of everyone like a star against the Angels."

"Then what happens to his little girl if he dies because of the Eva? We can't ask her to replace her father or lie that his death was an accident. She'd know what really happened, see all of the agency, even the ones that didn't do anything, as what killed him…and she'd be right. She'd rather have her teenage old man than anything else in her life right now."

"Sounds like the Third spoils her."

"She's only four years old, Asuka. Her mother, or rather the woman that had her is dead, her father's relations, excluding her own father, are either disinterested in her well-being or just want nothing to do with her. How do you live with that truth?"

"What about her maternal relations?"

"Either dead or in prison with no chance of getting out."

"Then she needs to grow some sense at how unfair the world is."

"I'd like to see you say that to her in front of her father."

With that, Asuka thought back to the video footage of Shinji facing the Fourth and Seventh Angel and how effective-but-reckless he was in beating them…and then, there was the fact that he yanked Misato for trying to speak to his daughter without his permission. She couldn't imagine trying to say anything to that little girl without exciting her father's fury; if he could throw Misato with little effort, then she would've been no different from a rag… She stopped herself from finishing that line of thought.

"Actually, maybe you should be the one to do it," she told him, trying not to imagine the outcome.

-x-

Shinji didn't feel so hot right now as he walked out of the NERV base. He had just finished handing in his resignation (despite the insistence that Commander Ikari stated that his son would continue to pilot the Eva) and cleaned out his locker (not that he had much to clean out to begin with). Some people that saw him leave seemed to speak with some praise, like he was doing them a favor or something by turning away. He didn't really understand them and just wanted to…

He must've lost consciousness and fell to the ground.

"…Someone help me pick him up…"

"…Piloting the Eva…"

"…This is why he needs to stop…"

"…Matter if it kills…"

The voices were few and he was uncertain of their concern. His own train of thoughts were scattered between memories past and present, what he had initially thought was true, but later discovered wasn't entirely true. How he discovered that his mother wasn't the good mother he had once thought her to be because of the lack of pictures and memories, the extent of his father's insanity and how awful they both were to him, before and after he was abandoned, kidnapped and raped.

"…Never again," he was able to utter as he slowly came to in a room, seeing Rei Ayanami looking down at him. "Never again."

-x-

"…The heart surgery he got from wherever he went to get it wasn't botched or anything," a male doctor explained to Gendo, Ritsuko, Fuyutsuki and Misato Shinji's current condition. "The problem is the stress he's under."

"Stress?" Misato questioned. "Stress from what?"

"In a word, NERV."

"You mean, us?" Fuyutsuki asked.

"That's right."

"You're saying that Shinji collapsed outside of the base and bled through his bandages…because we put him under a lot of stress?" Misato made sure she understood correctly.

"The stress from piloting the Eva, from having to put up with people he doesn't even know, with people he doesn't really give a damn for, anymore (the doctor meant this part for Gendo)… If it gets any worse, it only reduces his chances of living out what's left of his life. It's already been confirmed that if he pilots the Eva once more, it's going to kill him."

"That's a risk we must take," went Gendo, which disturbed each person in the room at how cold the commander was over his own son's very life.

"Sir," the doctor had to enforce, "given the physical deterioration caused by piloting the Eva, I must strongly recommend that the young man be cut loose from the agency."

"We don't have time to cut him loose."

"You want him to pilot until he drops dead?!"

-x-

"You really shouldn't be getting up, Pilot Ikari," Rei told Shinji as he got out of the bed.

"I'm getting up," he told her, now looking for his shoes. "What do you want?"

"I was ordered to inform you of Eva testing once you got up."

Shinji looked at her like she was crazy and responded, "Whose orders are these? That man's?"

"If you mean Commander Ikari, yes," she answered him.

"What part of 'never again' is impossible for him to comprehend? I'm never getting back into that deathtrap. You can do it because you have no free will to do anything for yourself, and that redhead, I honestly don't know or care why she does it at all, but I won't do it again. I have other things, better things to do than throw my life away for something I have absolutely no faith in."

Once he found his shoes and began putting them up, Rei uttered, "Commander Ikari has ordered that you continue to pilot the Eva until a replacement can be found."

"And did he say how long that could take?"

"He did not."

"He's either lying or has no intention of looking for a replacement…until AFTER I'm dead! Crazy bastard has no sense."

"Commander Ikari knows what he is doing."

He turned to look at her and uttered, "You can say whatever you want to say about him, but he has no sense or a heart. As far as I'm concerned, he can take his sense, his wife…and you…to the grave with him when he dies. Now, I'm walking out this room and away from all of you, so don't try to stop me."

"I've been ordered to stop you if you try to leave," Rei stated to him.

Shinji then looked at a chair beside him…and decided that actions were going to speak louder than words weren't to girl…and grabbed it and threw it at her before running out of the room.

Rei didn't have time to react and felt the impact of the chair hitting her and sending her falling to the floor, her face bloody from her nose getting broken.

-x-

"…This original version is so different from the one Daddy and I saw," Shado told Toya and Rumiko as they were looking at a black and white film from the Nineteen-Fifties about a giant creature that was disturbed from its ancient slumber and empowered by mankind's arrogance over nuclear power at Tendo's place. "How can that lady just tell her kids that they're going to their father instead of just trying to get away from the monster while there's still a chance to get away?"

"The movie was made recently after World War Two," Rumiko explained. "People back then were still scarred by the results of what that war did. Because they discovered a power that could harm millions of lives and poison the environment, the idea was what could happen if such a large creature could have existed during that time and was not only scarred by such a power…but had to punish people for their role in the discord and disturbing its slumber. That's what triggered the origin of the greatest creature the world has ever known."

Shado watched on the television as the creature breathed its poisonous fire breath at the buildings again, transforming the city into an ocean of fire. So far, she was convinced that later films based off this one were better because they gave the monster adversaries with which to face. But she really wished her daddy was here with them to watch the film. While being explained that he was just going back to NERV to inform that bad man that he was quitting, she became concerned that such a task was taking too long when it should've been very simple to just go in and tell the people that her father was done with them.

"Um, Ms. Rumiko," she spoke, "did Daddy say when he'd be back?"

"No, dear, he didn't," Rumiko answered, but was just as concerned. "He should've been back, though."

Tendo, who was also with them to watch the film, thought of a different reason to why the young father hadn't returned for his daughter; he suspected that his brother, being the arrogant, irresponsible and irredeemable piece of filth that he was, simply wasn't going to take even the smallest bit of refusal to do anything any further from anyone, including his own son. Although he didn't even build up a relationship with Shinji or his daughter, Tendo sighed at how the little girl worried for her father's safety and felt the misery of her not knowing where he was or when he would get back.

 _I don't even know him…but that shouldn't stop me from wanting to,_ he thought and grabbed his cane to help himself get up from out of his chair. "Rumiko, be a kind lady to this elder and lock the door behind me as I walk out. I just remembered that I need to go handle a tax return notice."

"Huh? Uh, okay," Rumiko responded and got up to lock the door behind him. _That's odd. He shouldn't have any tax-related business left to deal with. He taught me how to do taxes._

Heading to his truck, Tendo felt he was going crazy for even considering doing what he was thinking about doing, but knew it would only come to that when and if it did.

"Just how messed up is this nation after fifteen years?" He wondered, starting the ignition and driving out the alleyway.

-x-

"…Uh, someone should go see if the First Child is in need of surgery for her broken nose," a female nurse said, seeing Shinji getting into an elevator. "Have a good day, young man."

"I hope to have a good future if I leave this place," he responded, keeping his guard up in case anyone tried to stop him from leaving as the elevator doors closed.

What Shinji didn't know was that most of the personnel at NERV all had the same thought that it was better that he leave after discovering that the next time he piloted the Eva could've been his last time while still breathing.

"I'm coming back to you, Shado," he told himself.

The elevator stopped as it reached the floor he wanted and opened up to reveal the unshaven man from before, standing in the way.

"Don't mind me," he told Shinji. "I'm just heading to Central Dogma."

Shinji stepped out of the elevator and walked past the man.

"There was never a replacement pilot," he heard him say. "I checked. You were meant to be Unit-01's pilot all the time."

This just made Shinji walk faster to the front door.

"Hey, is that him?!" A man shouted. "Stop him!"

"What for? He's done." A woman expressed. "I'm not going after him."

He made it out the front door and just prayed that nobody would come after him again.

-x-

"…The Third Child has left the base again," Ritsuko informed Gendo.

"Where was security?" He demanded, discovering that Rei was assaulted by Shinji and had her nose broken by his hitting her head with a chair. "Why didn't the trauma personnel intervene?"

"They're claiming they did, but there's no indication that they tried to do anything to stop him from leaving. If anything, they each encouraged him to leave."

"Ikari," went Fuyutsuki. "This is life or death for the young father. He's chosen life, however much of it he has left, and he won't, nor should he be made to, throw it away for the Eva. You just won't accept that he's done."

"He's done…when I say he's done." Gendo told his former teacher.

The Sub-Commander then sighed and walked away. All he could do was hope that a little girl would be seeing her father tonight.

-x-

He got further away than the previous time, but he was still a ways from the tea shop in the city. But he felt calmer than he hadn't been at NERV, relieved of his unwanted responsibilities that his parents tried to force upon him. His heart wasn't even causing him pain.

 _Some would say that time is without meaning to any that live lives without endings,_ he thought, turning a corner on the side of the block, _but what is an ending to those that can experience it, know they have to face it…and fear it, all at once?_

He suddenly stopped walking and leaned against a streetlight to catch his breath. It wasn't anything to do with his heart or chest-related injuries; he just needed to catch his breath from walking around a lot after he got away from NERV. But he felt the lack of energy and adrenaline in his body getting to him, and how the fatigue was causing a need for rest. At least…he was hoping it was just a need for rest and nothing more serious.

"I don't want to die like this," he said to himself. "I don't want to continue being a pawn in my disgraceful parents' twisted game of life and death."

Once he felt a little rejuvenated from the minute of rest, he resumed his trek to the tea shop…but then stopped and turned around. He saw a black Sedan and immediately assumed that it was the men in black suits again, sent by his father to take him back to NERV against his will or just to tail him to where his daughter was. Without much hesitation, he continued to walk further away from the car, hoping that they would either drive past him or mistake him as some other teen. He also hoped that he wasn't tagged or microchipped while he was incapacitated at NERV by his father, just to keep an unwanted eye on him.

-x-

"…They removed the tracking chip from under his neck?" Gendo questioned Fuyutsuki, discovering that the locator for his son was disabled.

"The doctors said they had to remove it when they had to staunch the bleeding from around his neck," the Sub-Commander explained, though he felt the decision to remove the bug was the right thing to do because the young father was done. "They didn't want to risk causing an infection or new loss of blood by putting the chip back in."

Though Gendo suspected that the doctors removed the tracking were more sympathetic to the plight of the Third Child and lied about the reasons for not putting the chip back in the boy. He then decided that if he was regain control over the situation, he had to do it himself. Luckily, he had obtained the address of his brother's tea shop and decided to pay him an undue visit to obtain the whereabouts of the boy.

"Fuyutsuki, handle things here," he told the Sub-Commander as he got up from his desk.

Fuyutsuki kept silent as the most ruthless man he had ever met left the office.

 _He's going to make his granddaughter an orphan if he continues to persist,_ he thought, already imagining two different outcomes that could happen: One was the little girl standing by herself in front of a lonely grave on a cold day…and the other was of both Shinji and daughter on a flooring someplace, dead from gunshot wounds, surrounded by a pool of blood.

"Ugh," Fuyutsuki shuddered, knowing that both outcomes were terrible…and that there was no point in forcing the girl's father to continue piloting the Eva if it was going to kill him and take him away from his only daughter. _Dammit, Yui… We should've stopped you that day. We should've stopped you!_

He took out his cell phone and contacted Captain Katsuragi.

"Katsuragi, we have a situation," he told her.

-x-

Tendo drove around the street until he came to a stoplight like every other car around him.

 _Come on, Shinji,_ he thought, _where are you now?_

He looked to his right, at the sidewalk, and felt a prayer had been answered when he saw someone that looked like his nephew walking down the street.

Honk! Honk, honk! He hit his car horn, hoping to get his attention.

The person turned their head to face them…and revealed themselves to b none other than Shinji. He recognized Tendo's truck and looked back towards the rest of the car traffic before he crossed the street to get to the truck.

"Are you alright?" Tendo asked him as he opened the passenger side door and sat down.

"What's the best way to say that I feel like that I've been cut open and ripped up in many ways and stitched closed and left to rot a little?" Shinji asked him as he buckled in the seatbelt.

"There's no best way to say that…only mutilation."

Tendo looked at his face and almost thought he had seen his little brother's older face echoed in it, but because of the tattoo-like scars that represented a young man that suffered more than unnecessarily accepted, and because he had a worn appearance in his youthful physique, he could almost be mistaken for a tomboy a little if he got most of his looks from his mother's side of the family.

"What is it?" Shinji asked him, noticing that he had been staring at him.

Tendo blinked and came to his senses.

"Nothing," he responded. "It's just… You look tired."

Shinji sighed and leaned back in the seat, his head pressed against the window.

"I am tired," he confessed. "I'm tired of my parents and their puppetry, their carelessness, their agenda that exploits me as their primary pawn in their heartless chess game. They don't understand that they've taken from me more than I was willing to give at the time. They're like parasites, always taking for themselves and never giving back."

Even if he drove him back to the tea shop, Tendo didn't feel comfortable with letting his nephew and grandniece leave while the young father was unwell.

-x-

"…So, even if they used the device to stop him in the end, this Yamane guy believes that another creature like him will return in the future?" Shado asked Rumiko.

"That's right," the teen mother answered her. "And he was right when they made the film that takes place a few years after this one. The only change was that they added another monster for him to fight."

"Was it in black and white or color?"

"Black and white," went Toya to her.

"As nice as these old films are, I actually like color more than black and white."

"Yeah, the newer films are where the interests are these days," Rumiko agreed with her.

"Ugh," Shado shuddered suddenly.

"What's wrong, Shado?" Toya asked.

"I just got a bad feeling," she explained.

"What kind of bad feeling?" Rumiko asked her.

"Like something is about to happen and someone gets hurt."

Rumiko was about to explain to the little girl that they were in a quiet neighborhood and Tendo had a panic room when she suddenly had a bad feeling in her heart. If it was anything like what Shado felt, then she had to believe that it was her maternal instincts warning her of danger.

"Okay, we better move now," she told the children and quickly scooped them into her arms and vacated the living room.

BANG! A gunshot was heard and Rumiko looked back at the front door that now had a missing doorknob as someone kicked it open.

"Aah!" Shado an Toya gasped as Rumiko carried them down the stairs to the back of the building.

-x-

"Gah!" Shinji gasped, feeling like someone had done something wrong.

"What?!" Tendo asked him as he drove into the alleyway behind the tea shop.

"Something's wrong," he told him. "Shado… Rumiko… Toya… They're in trouble."

They stopped and Shinji struggled to get out of the truck as Tendo reached for his cane and walked around it and helped Shinji up.

"Oh, St. Jude," Tendo expressed, seeing that the door to the stairway was on the ground, riddled with six bullet holes. "Rumiko! Toya!"

"Shado!" Shinji called out for his daughter, but there was no response from any of them.

The staircase walls had a hand print of blood smeared on them, and one of the banisters had been broken. On the staircase was also a sandal for a right foot…and a little shoe for a small child that Shinji recognized as his daughter's.

Tendo balled his left fist, remembering a similar incident just like this from years ago.

"Dammit, Gendo," he grunted.

"Yeah, it was him," went Shinji, bending down to pick up something underneath his daughter's shoe. "He wants a trade."

"…Mommy," they both heard a little boy's voice, and Tendo and Shinji went upstairs to the kitchen, finding Toya on the floor, holding onto his waist.

"Toya," Shinji gasped. "What happened? Are you alright?"

Toya looked up at them and coughed before saying, "Your father came… He had a gun… Started shooting at us… Mommy tried to get us to the panic room, but then he… He shot Mommy in her leg and made us fall down the stairs… He took Mommy and Shado."

Shinji helped Toya onto his feet and into a nearby chair before looking at the note again. It read, _"I have the two women in your life. If you want them back, you know what you must do. Gendo Ikari."_

He then gave Tendo the note, who expressed that Gendo had crossed a line that he couldn't be allowed to walk away unscathed from.

"I'm calling the cops," he told them, taking out his cell phone.

"The cops?" Shinji questioned, irritated by the would-be idea. "The guy runs a paramilitary agency! They practically own the cops!"

"Well, what, then?" Tendo asked his nephew.

Shinji pressed his left hand to his chest and breathed in a new breath.

"Let the sins of the parents be visited upon them by their children that won't carry them," he said to him, knowing what he was going to do the very instant the opportunity presented itself.

To be continued…

A/N: I think y'all knew Gendo was going to cross the line before it even happened. He's known for crossing lines and doing the unforgivable. But what do you think Shinji's going to do?


	12. Unforgivable

Creation began on 11-23-16

Creation ended on 01-12-17

Neon Genesis Evangelion

Different from You: Unforgivable

Rumiko had only known fear of this sort thrice in her lifetime. The first was when she discovered her mother's fury at her for being her father's would-be replacement for her after finding out she was pregnant (something she didn't understand at the time because she didn't grasp things like why her father wouldn't touch her mother). The second was how harsh her mother had been to her during her pregnancy and after the birth of her son, causing her to run away from home with Toya in fear of being killed by her sooner or later. And the third was when the city was being evacuated and not everyone was able to get away because of the traffic, and she and her son were under a table in the tea shop just waiting for the end that didn't come because Shinji shaved off a measure of his own life so that everyone else could still live theirs. But now, here she and Shado were, under the threat of death by none other than Shinji's own father, who had them at gunpoint in an elevator that was taking them to the Geo-Front, trying to ignore the gunshot she had gotten in her leg because the man shot at them.

Shado didn't like the man at all for what he did to them…and hoped her father would be by to do something about this misfortune that didn't need to be just because he quit for her sake.

"You pussyfoot just because Shinji doesn't want to continue piloting your wife's abomination?" She heard Rumiko say to Gendo. "He told me everything he found out from the last time he was in that monstrosity, and the both of you, you and your wife, his mother, aren't going to prosper with what you're attempting to do."

"Unless he agrees to continue piloting the Eva, mankind has no future," Gendo responded.

"You mean that only for yourself. Unless he continues, YOU don't have a future. You're no better than a common thief that just got sentenced to the end of their life. You had nothing before you manipulated Shinji into piloting the Eva…and that's all you'll have if anything happens to him or his daughter if anyone tries something irresponsible and unforgivable. You'll have absolutely nothing. You'll be absolutely nothing."

"Shut up."

Shado didn't know what was going on (and she wasn't sure if she even wanted to know what was going on), only that this man, who cared nothing for her father, Ms. Rumiko, Toya or herself was just trying to make her father do something that was hurting him, despite the promise made that he would stop if it got too serious, too strenuous.

"You don't even love your son, so why try to exploit him?" Rumiko questioned, which had Shado's attention. "You ignore him for most of his life, and then you send for him to come here only to fight in a war that makes no sense because you keep the truth hidden away. I mean, why Shinji? Of all the young people born after Second Impact that you could've gone after, you choose the one person that you hate to serve as your lackey. Do you hate him that much that you want to send him to an early grave and separate a young girl from her father?"

"Only an infant needs its parents," Gendo retorted, and then aimed the gun in his hand at Shado.

Shado turned her head away to look out the window at the underground world below them and said, "I will always need my Daddy. He's my best friend and the only family I have that means everything to me. I wouldn't expect you to understand. I just hope that you one day find yourself on your knees, begging Daddy for his forgiveness…only to find that he has none for you. A lady I will never address as my mother hurt him long ago…and you're a man that still wants to hurt him…and you won't say why. I wish I could pity you, mister…but…you really don't deserve any pity. Not like Ms. Rumiko does because you hurt her."

It was the way the little girl looked when she said all of that. She might've looked like a younger Shinji, but she also looked like a younger Yui and Rei to him. So young, so innocent, so devoted. There was no shred of sympathy in her that was directed towards him that she would direct elsewhere to others.

"Thank you, Shado," Rumiko praised her.

-x-

"…So what are you going to do to your father when you meet him?" Tendo asked Shinji as he drove the truck to where Shinji told him they could get into the Geo-Front.

"If I manage to beat him into a pulp, then that's likely to get him to accept that I'm done with him and his wife," Shinji explained his plan. "But if I have to cross the line and put him down like a rabid dog…then may I be forgiven for taking his life because he wouldn't stop."

"But can you really do it? Could you really kill your father?"

Shinji, despite his weariness and need for rest (and possibly medication), sighed that he may not have a choice if his father harmed his daughter and Rumiko.

"Are you certain that the woman you asked to look after Toya at the hospital can be trusted?" He asked Tendo, concerned for Rumiko's son.

"I'm sure, Shinji," he answered. "I was present with Rumiko when she and her son were vaccinated…and she frequents the tea shop. Pastries and chamomile tea."

"I'm sorry. It's hard to put my trust in adults."

"You were hurt by adults. I don't blame you for being cautious whenever you're around them."

"I chalk up my cautiousness to my paternal instincts. I always need to be on the defensive because I have to look after Shado. Who else is going to if something happens to me?"

"You're just one person, Shinji. You try to do everything at once, you burn yourself out."

"I'm used to burning myself out."

"You and Rumiko. And you both burn…each and everyday for your children. It's only me saying this, but I do hope that you both survive whatever's bound to happen next. Too many good people have suffered enough."

-x-

It was hard to walk with one of her legs housing a bullet hole, but Rumiko didn't have much choice in the matter with Gendo jabbing her in the back with his pistol as he forced them to walk down the hall in the base to the cage that housed Unit-01.

Shado, in her patience of trying to see a way out of this mess that Gendo was making, noticed a bathroom nearby and stopped walking, holding onto Rumiko's uninjured left leg, forcing the teen mother to stop, as well.

"I didn't permit you to stop," Gendo told them.

"What's wrong, Shado?" Rumiko asked the girl kindly.

"I gotta go potty," she explained, pointing to the bathroom.

"You heard the little lady," Rumiko told Gendo. "She has to go."

"We don't have time to waste on a meaningless triviality."

"No!" Shado raised her voice at the man. "You show up at Mr. Tendo's home unannounced and kidnap Ms. Rumiko and I! You left Toya on the floor in pain! You hurt Ms. Rumiko's leg! You have been nothing but cruel to the both of us…and we've done nothing to you to deserve any of your awfulness, and I'm not taking another step further until you let me go potty! And if this is the way it's gotta be, then you're just gonna have to carry me the rest of the way, and I swear to Daddy, if you so much as touch me again, I will go potty on you!"

"Are you threatening me? Are you threatening me with going to the bathroom?" Gendo questioned her.

"Yeah!"

Rumiko looked at the girl and then at Gendo.

"Heh-heh," she chuckled, despite the pain she was in. "She truly is Daddy's little girl. I'd do as she asks, too. I don't want to have to clean up after her if you don't let her go."

Gendo sighed and relented.

"Hurry up," he told the girl, and she walked over to the bathroom.

Rumiko then followed her.

"Don't stop me. I gotta go, too," she told him.

Once they were both in, Rumiko followed Shado to the last stall at the end and leaned against the sinks.

"Did you really have to go?" She asked the girl.

"Yeah," she answered her, "but I also wanted to get away from him. Are you okay?"

"It only hurts when I walk."

"He's gonna hurt us, no matter what we do, isn't he? And he's gonna hurt Daddy, too, isn't he?"

Rumiko didn't want to lie to the little girl, but she had to admit, even if it was to herself, that Tendo's brother was certainly not the understanding or merciful type. Even if Shinji did come to get them or did whatever his father wanted him to do, there was no guarantee that he would let any of them go.

"If it comes to that, we should make sure to get as far from him as we can," she told Shado instead. "If I see an opportunity to do so, I'll get the gun away from him while you run."

"What about you?" Shado asked her, concerned for her leg.

"A fourteen-year-old girl that can barely walk or a little girl that can run? Who do you think they'll try to get first? Me or you?"

Shado then did the only thing she felt she could do: She just hugged Rumiko's legs.

-x-

"…I swear, this place is darker than before," said Tendo to Shinji as they stopped in front of the NERV pyramid.

"There was never any light down here, except for the sunlight that gets down here by some fiber optics system I could care less for," Shinji told him as they walked into the building.

Tendo followed him, but had to stop when he noticed a speck of blood on the floor. He then looked up ahead at Shinji…and saw blood dropping from his right hand.

-x-

Once they stepped out of the bathroom, the girls saw Gendo again, pointing towards the end of the hall with his pistol.

"I swear to St. Jude, you're among the worst parents to have ever breathed the free air," Rumiko told him, needing to point that out because of his behavior.

Gendo recalled Tendo's fascination with non-Asian figures and found it bothersome that a teen mother would pick up on his beliefs.

"Less talking, more walking," he uttered, and they got to stepping.

Further and further down they went…until they reached a door to a large chamber…where Unit-01 resided…and Shado just stopped.

"That's the same monster you had my Daddy use to fight those other monsters," she told Gendo. "Why'd you bring us down here?"

"It's not for you to know anything," he responded. "Go on."

But Shado nodded her head in the negative.

"Go on," Gendo repeated, lowering the gun at her head.

The little girl, her hands balding into tiny fists as her face contorted into fear-driven rage, continued to nod in the negative.

"I'm not going anywhere near that thing," she told him, and he frowned.

"You're useless," he responded.

Rumiko then grabbed Gendo by his arm and tried to wrestle the gun from him.

"Go!" She yelled at Shado. "Run!"

The girl did as instructed and ran around the two.

"No!" Gendo yelled, trying to get free of the teen. "Damn you!"

He used his other arm and hit Rumiko in her face, but she didn't back down. The girl had to protect her friend's daughter from her grandfather, no matter what the outcome was. As Gendo then kicked her in her abdomen with his left leg, Rumiko coughed, but held onto his gun-toting arm…until she gave in against her more civilized conscience and bit him as hard as she could in his arm.

"Aaaurgh!" Gendo groaned. "You little bitch!"

He kicked her again, harder, but all she did was bite down harder.

"Graaah!" He heard her go, either speaking or groaning in pain from his assault on her.

Bang! His gun went off; he hoped that a bullet being fired would frighten her, but she just held onto his arm, never letting up.

He turned around and saw the little girl had just turned a corner.

"Damn you!" He yelled at Rumiko, and then ran her against the wall on his right, slamming her hard against it.

"Ophf!" She went, feeling like she did when her father had gotten atop her when she was little, but she still wouldn't let go.

Gendo slammed her hard against the wall again, and this time was more effective, causing Rumiko to loosen her grip on his arm. He then grabbed her head and slammed it against the wall, watching her slide to the floor, leaving a bloody smear behind her head.

"Petulant brats," he uttered, and looked at his wrist, seeing that she drew blood.

Rumiko was dazed and reminded of the abuse she suffered at the hands of her mother, before and after she gave birth to her son, and was unable to look up at Gendo as he pressed the gun to her temple.

"I cannot achieve my objective without the boy or his brat," she heard him say to him. "What use are you beyond a lure?"

If Gendo was going to pull the damn trigger, he certainly took his time with her. But Rumiko didn't fear death; every time she thought something terrible was going to happen to either Toya or herself, something just happened to help them see another day. All she had left to fear was the truth behind her son's paternity, which she would've been fine never knowing about.

"You might already be dying, so I'd be wasting a bullet on you," Gendo told her, and she heard footsteps receding away from her.

"Run, Shado," she uttered, falling to the ground. "Run…"

-x-

She ran. She ran as fast as she could down the empty halls, needing to get away from her grandfather before he did something awful to her. Shado never thought she could run as fast as she was right now when Rumiko told her to, but here she was, probably far away from Gendo…but still needing to run and find a place to hide. When she turned a corner, she saw Rei Ayanami, dressed in that ugly diving suit that was similar to the one that her father wore (only his was more conservative, whatever that word meant whenever she heard it, only knowing that when her father said it, it meant it hid everything you weren't supposed to see in public), with that vacant expression she always had.

 _If I'm by myself and I see this girl or the redhead or anyone else, I run,_ Shado thought, and ran the other end of the corner that the blue-haired girl was, presumably, going down for some other reason.

-x-

"…Hey, Third," Asuka expressed towards Shinji as she and Kaji saw him and Tendo walking down the hall. "Looks like you couldn't stay away…"

Shinji grabbed her by her coat and, surprisingly, lifted her off her feet and slammed her against the wall on his left.

"I don't have time for your egotistical, self-righteous bullshit!" He told her. "Where's that bastard father of mine?"

"I don't know," Asuka answered him, and he dropped her to her knees.

"Then what good are you?" He expressed, walking down the hall.

Asuka was about to say something to him as she got up, but saw a red stain on her pink coat, right where Shinji grabbed her.

"What the… Did you just bleed on me?" She asked, but Shinji was too far away to hear her.

"Can you tell us where Gendo Ikari is, sir?" Tendo asked Kaji.

"You can try Central Dogma," he suggested to him.

"Thank you."

Tendo followed Shinji into an elevator and informed him of his father likely being in Central Dogma.

"Kami, I am going to break his face," Shinji sighed, keeling over slightly as his breathing became heavy. "Damn injuries."

-x-

Hiding under some stairs, Shado prayed the literal shadows under the steps kept her out of sight and away from her grandfather and anyone that listened to him. She crouched on the ground and tried to keep quiet as she heard the sound of someone's footsteps, and shut her eyes in woe.

"…She clearly has no concept of hiding where the cameras can't find you," she heard a man's voice just above her. "We've located the Third Child's daughter. We'll be bringing her to Commander Ikari shortly. Sorry, little girl. It's nothing personal."

Shado cowered at the thought of being handed over to her grandfather.

BASH! She heard something hard and heavy hit something.

"Aaaurgh!" The man's voice she heard went, but she kept her eyes closed.

"Hey, put that pipe down!" Another man's voice shouted, but then another bashing sound came, followed by the guy screaming as he fell to whatever was happening. "Urgh!"

At least three more bashing sounds were heard before the sound of something hitting the floor was heard by Shado.

"It kinda feels personal," she heard Rumiko's voice, hindered by a sense of anger she often heard in her father's voice whenever he was furious with other people. "Shado? Are you okay?"

She opened her eyes and looked out of the darkness toward the teenage girl that was Toya's mother, and saw her partially covered in blood on her head and on her shirt, holding a piece of pipe that was smeared with blood from the two men she used it on.

"Can we go now, please?" She asked her.

"Nothing would be more appreciated by me if we did and found your father," Rumiko told her, slowly lowering to her knees and reaching out for her friend's daughter with her left hand, grimacing from her own injuries.

Shado reached out for her and came out from under the stairs.

"That man hurt you again," she told her, saddened by what her grandfather had done to her beyond shooting her in the leg.

"My pain is nothing…compared to the fear of what's worse to come," Rumiko confessed, and picked her and put her on her back.

-x-

Tendo didn't know if Shinji was either just an angry teen father…or just desperate to save his daughter from his failure of a brother that got on both their nerves. As they vacated the elevator and walked down to Central Dogma, the tea shop owner couldn't help but wonder where his nephew found such strength to carry out his resolve to walk away from Gendo's problems.

"What are you going to do after you get your daughter back?" He felt he had to ask Shinji.

"If it comes to it, leave the city, leave the region…and the nation itself if it means walking away from NERV and the cruelty of the Ikari family with my little girl." Shinji answered him.

"You succeed, could I ask you to do one favor for me?"

"What favor?"

"I don't trust your father as far as I can tolerate his unjust treatment of people. But if we find Rumiko, too… Will you take her and Toya with you and Shado if you do leave?"

Shinji stopped walking and turned to face Tendo.

"If I live to see another day… I'd probably ask her if she and Toya would come with us. But then, I have to wonder what I could do in my future; ever since Shado and I got here, before we met Rumiko and Toya, I found my hands rotating between being those meant to show kindness towards the people I care about…and those that bring pain and misery. I blame my parents and the Ikaris for this rotation between devotion and atrocity. I'd rather be without the hands of a brutal savage and go back to having the hands I hold my daughter with."

"I don't blame you for wanting that."

They entered Central Dogma, but it was empty. Not even Gendo was there.

"The Eva," Shinji sighed at that realization. "If he's not here, he's in the cages where Unit-01 resides."

He even feared the possibility that his father would try and put Shado in the Eva; since his daughter was also born after Second Impact and the woman that had her after raping him was dead, that made her a potential candidate for the Evas. And he needed to keep her safe from that nightmare.

"These Evas… Won't Gendo try to put Rumiko in one of them?" Tendo asked him.

"No, she was born the day before Second Impact. Even if he wanted to, that bastard couldn't use her for any of them."

They walked out of the control center and back into the hallway.

-x-

"…Stop right there," Rumiko heard the blue-haired albino say to her as she and Shado found themselves face-to-face with her.

"Rei Ayanami," Rumiko addressed the girl. "You're the other girl that gives Shinji a hard time."

"I have orders to bring the little girl to Commander Ikari," Rei explained her presence in front of the pair. "Hand her over."

Shado was disgusted with the albino girl's attitude and how she just listens to a bad man like her grandfather without any hesitation.

"If you want Shado, try and get her," Rumiko told her, raising the pipe in her hand. "But I warn you, I'm not going to be merciful if you do try. And I have to admit…your diving suit doesn't look good. I can see now why Shinji hates them. They don't hide anything. You look straight-up naked, even when you're not."

Rei merely tilted her head to the right; she had never been spoken to about the plugsuit and its would-be indecency.

Bang! A gunshot was heard…and Rumiko fell to the ground with Shado.

"Aaah!" They both gasped, and Shado looked up and saw Gendo, holding a smoking gun; he had shot at Rumiko again.

Now Rumiko had gunshot wounds in both her legs…and the lack of adrenaline rushing through her veins didn't help to numb her to the pain.

 _No,_ she thought, trying to get up. "You spineless bastard."

Gendo walked over and then pointed the gun at her head.

"You try to run, and she dies," he threatened Shado with the teen mother's life.

"You're crazy," she called him.

"And you're nothing more than a means to an end."

"No disrespect to Shado when I say this, but I hope Shinji beats the asshole out of you," Rumiko told them, turning onto her back to look up at the megalomaniac. "You're a monster."

Gendo then aimed his gun at Rumiko's chest.

The two fallen girls then saw a pair of arms appear behind Gendo and grabbed him by his neck and right arm, pulling him backwards.

"Aaurgh!" Gendo gasped, turning around, revealing to the girls and Rei that his attacker was none other than Shinji, who was beyond furious.

Further down the hall was Tendo, walking as fast as he could to help resolve the situation before it got further out of hand.

"You go to my girlfriend's employer's home where she lives with her son without an invite! You kidnap my daughter and girlfriend! You left Toya for dead! You shot Rumiko in her legs!" Shinji shouted the number of horrible things his father did during the time he broke into Tendo's home and kidnapped the girls. "You're history! You're history, old man! History!"

Gendo tried to remove his left arm from his neck, but he couldn't get a grip upon the wrist and he dropped the gun when he felt Shinji's right hand knock it away. He tried to get him by slamming himself against the wall, but Shinji forced his head to the left and felt his teeth sink into his flesh.

"Aaaah!" He yelled.

Rei saw Shinji draw blood from Commander Ikari's neck and made an attempt to move towards them.

"I wouldn't try to get involved, young lady," Tendo warned Rei, watching his brother fall to the floor. "Unless you got a child yourself, back off."

Shinji then raised his father's head…and slammed it hard onto the floor, causing Gendo's legs to spasm before he gave out a yell of pain. When he got up, his jaw was bloody and his chest was bleeding.

Gendo then came to and grabbed Shinji's left leg, raising his bloody face up.

"I should've put your little bitch of a daughter down like the bitch she is!" He raised his voice, reaching for the gun.

Rumiko reached up and held Shado while Tendo used his cane to hit his brother on his right arm so that he couldn't reach the gun.

Shinji picked up the gun and pointed it at his father, whom Tendo then kicked hard in the waist. He decided not to use the gun and just kick his father himself.

"Aaah! Ugh!" Gendo groaned as he struggled to get up.

"Oh, pass out already!" Shinji told him, and kicked him again.

"He's a stubborn-ass goat!" Tendo grunted; Gendo's Chinese Zodiac animal sign was the goat while his brother's sign was the snake. "Ugh!"

Shado looked away as Gendo was getting his comeuppance for his actions against them while Rumiko noticed Rei slowly approaching her boss.

"Don't…even…think about it," she told her, looking at her.

Rei merely stood and watched as Commander Ikari was soon spat on by Shinji before being kicked again in his chest.

"Shinji, that's enough," Tendo told the boy, trying to hold him back now before he crossed the line. "That's enough, Shinji."

Shinji looked at him, then at Gendo, who looked like he just got rolled by a pro that preferred to get rough, barely breathing with blood spilling from the bite on his neck. As he calmed down, he looked down at his hands and the gun that he could've used on his father, but decided not to. He handed the gun to Tendo, who took it from him.

"We gotta check our girls," Tendo told him, and walked over Gendo towards Rumiko and Shado.

Looking down at his hands again and at his father, Shinji wasn't sure if he could even hold his daughter after harming his father.

"Daddy?" Shado's voice reached out to him, and he looked down at her, seeing her looking up at him.

"I…" He spoke up, but couldn't find his words.

"He hurt Rumiko in both her legs," she told him, and the sound of Rumiko groaning in pain as Tendo helped her up was heard. "He hurt someone that never did anything at him. He got what he deserved."

He wanted to pick her up, but his hands were so bloody.

Shado remedied his problem by just holding him by his legs.

"It's alright now," she told him.

"Aah! Aah! Aw, St. Jude!" Rumiko groaned as Tendo gave her his cane to support her left leg while he helped carry her on her right side. "I can't believe he shot me in both my legs."

"I can't believe he actually shot at you," Tendo responded.

As the four started to walk away, just wanting to leave the Geo-Front, they had to stop because of Ms. Katsuragi, who was in their way of leaving now, accompanied by eight men in suits.

Shinji put his daughter down and sighed.

"Okay," he uttered. "Who's next?"

"Captain Katsuragi," they heard Gendo utter. "Detain these four, immediately."

"The only one getting detained, Commander Ikari," went Misato to them, "is you."

This was a surprise! The suits started walking past the four victims and towards Gendo, placing handcuffs on him.

"What is the meaning of this?!" Gendo demanded.

"I was contacted by Sub-Commander Fuyutsuki, and he confided in me that you were crossing the line. It turns out he was right. Trespassing on personal and private property, breaking and entering, kidnapping, assault with a deadly weapon, endangering the welfare of minors, even just harassment. The Committee will be informed of these offenses and how far you went to endanger your son and his daughter and friends."

-x-

A solid month went by, and NERV had more than its share of problems during that time that Gendo instigated. With the loss of the Third Child, the paramilitary agency had to deal with any future attacks with the Angels with just two pilots because Unit-01 was declared unsafe due to the injuries it caused the boy due to the high and unstable synchronization. While most found it a simple operation to deal with, the only one complaining that they still needed the Third Child was the very guy that tried to cause his death. Not that anyone else agreed with him, though.

After SEELE was informed of the severity of the situation regarding the Third Child and his unwillingness to continue piloting the Eva, they let Gendo off with a severe warning: If he went after the Third Child again, or anyone associated with him, such as his bastard child or fellow teen parent and her child, he would be serving his felony sentences in prison instead of just having a restraining order against him. It was agreed upon that a dying pilot was of no further use and was better off left alone than sent to an early grave.

"…I haven't heard anything new about the teen parents since the last time they were here," said Ritsuko to Misato as they were monitoring the synchronization test between Asuka and Unit-02. "Have you heard anything?"

"Only that Shinji got a bad bill of health from the doctor the last I heard," Misato explained; she had actually gone to Tendo's tea shop to speak with the elder brother of Gendo and found that Shinji would likely be drinking tea for the rest of his life if he had any hopes of seeing old age. "Beyond that, I don't think he and his daughter are in the city, anymore."

"They were only staying until he got his affairs in order."

-x-

The park by the small lake was dull, but at least had a sense of tranquility that he got in his tea shop. So this was something Tendo was willing to overlook for the time being.

"…I take it you don't enjoy the park much," he heard a man say to him, and looked up from the bench he was sitting on and saw Fuyutsuki standing a few feet away.

"I've always found parks to be somewhat more peaceful when filled with young people with children running about," said Tendo to him. "I heard that Japan's capital is being moved back to what's left of Tokyo-2 because Tokyo-3 was deemed unsafe."

"Yes, that's true…and because the Japanese government prefers to keep people in the loop of decision making. It wasn't an easy choice."

"What is easy these days?"

"You're referring to any recent choices in particular?"

"I had to watch my nephew leave the city so that he and his daughter would be safe from his father. Whatever chance I had to know the two of them personally was wasted because Gendo wasn't punished to the full extent of the law like he was supposed to be. Even I don't know where they went. I just hope that they and Rumiko and Toya are doing fine."

It wasn't like they went into Witness Protection, but Tendo did help the four leave the city for their own protection and ensure that NERV wouldn't have second thoughts about exploiting the young father or his daughter just to defeat inhuman monsters that they knew nothing about. All he could hope for was that he would receive some sort of sign that they were doing alright.

"I am sorry you didn't get to know him," Fuyutsuki sympathized.

To be continued…

A/N: I'm hoping the next chapter will be the last one for this story, but if it gets a sequel, it'll be the first one to do so and not an alternate take on the story.


	13. One Year Later for Hope

Creation began on 01-12-17

Creation ended on 01-23-17

Neon Genesis Evangelion

Different from You: One Year Later for Hope

Tokyo-3's population and economy reached a standstill during the month of October of Twenty-Fifteen and hadn't gotten any better or worse. It was bad for a lot of businesses, including Tendo's tea shop. But on a brighter note, there hadn't been any further Angel attacks since the last one that nearly blew up the city into an extension of the Pacific Ocean. This, unfortunately, put NERV on constant standby.

-x-

Ring-ring-ring! Tendo's house phone rang, and the elder picked up.

"Hello, Rokubungi residence," he greeted the caller.

"Hello, Tendo," responded a female voice to him. "It's Yui."

"Oh, hey."

Tendo really didn't have much apathy for the wife of his brother like he did with him, but did pity her for her association with him. But even he had his limits and wouldn't cross lines that were laced with deception or betrayal.

"How are things with your tea shop?" She asked him.

"Not many people come for tea, but I thank my employees for their time and service."

"The city's lost a lot of people in the last few months. But things are sure to get better, sooner or later. The film industry has gotten better with their recent films."

"I've seen _Godzilla Resurgence_ three times this week already, and I still don't understand why I prefer the previous film incarnation from two years earlier over the latest incarnation."

There was a short silence between the two before Yui spoke up again.

"Putting the economy aside," she said to him, "the reason I'm calling is because of… I've gone over his medical records again and… I'm sure you know as well as I do that there's no way that Shinji could have survived for over a year due to what happened the previous year."

Ever since her return from wherever she was after a so-called story to explain that she had faked her death because she was threatened, Yui had looked over her son's last recorded medical records at NERV and concluded for herself that the extent of Shinji's Eva-related injuries were more severe than anticipated and would've shortened his life severely to just another year before he succumbed to them.

"Some people manage to beat cancer when they're told they have only a few months and live for three-six years or so," he countered her assumption that Shinji was likely dead. "Only inoperable conditions have severe repercussions on people, such as brain tumors or failing organs that can't be replaced. What makes you think he can't beat the odds against him?"

"Nothing, really. It's just…with the recent discoveries and revelations that relate to the scientific field of longevity and life extension… Only now, everyone's trying to put a price tag on the methods used to improve one's quality of life."

"I wouldn't know, not concerned with my quality of life. I eat well, I exercise regularly… If I'm lucky, I'll die a natural death at age one-hundred-one."

"But…suppose that…by some miracle…that Shinji is still alive…and he were to try to contact you… You would let me know, right? You would…tell me?"

"No, actually," Tendo answered her, needing to be honest with her and himself. "I wouldn't. Not because of a lack of trust, but because of concern for his well-fare and that of his daughter's. After what happened last year with my brother and his willingness to go to extremes, I saw just how much family means to him. It doesn't mean a thing to him. Of course, even if I didn't tell you or anyone else, there's always the chance that I probably wouldn't have to. Any paramilitary agency such as NERV would have resources to deal with trying to find people through other people. I mean, I'm sure you're monitoring all of my calls, have my computer bugged to check for any emails or have my place under surveillance in case I get visitors. But I will tell you this. If Shinji were still alive wherever he is, I hope that it's somewhere far from Japan where he can be free from the violence he found himself surrounded by and he can just be a good father for his little girl whose only real crime was having a criminal for a mother. And I hope he doesn't try to contact me because…as much as I wanted to get to know him and Shado…I wouldn't endanger him by giving up his whereabouts. Just because someone leaves or is let go of…it doesn't mean that anyone else's done with them if they decide they still see a reason to…reassign them."

He heard her sigh and respond, "I am sorry about what my husband has done over the years…and what my own family has done. I am…very sorry."

"I know you are. Me, too."

He hung up and returned to his kitchen table, where he picked up a letter he received in the mail earlier that day. It was a letter that must've confused some people because of the return address being from an island nowhere near Japan…and Tendo didn't know anyone by an American name. Fortunately, nobody went through his mail or probably did a background check.

" _Hey, Tendo,"_ the letter read as he silently read it to himself. _"We're hoping the weather is at least tolerable in Japan. Here is…_ _well, it's not like anywhere else, that's all I can say. All I should say, really. We think the new tea remedies you had suggested are helping in his recovery. He's never seemed more alive and his little girl has her father who doesn't have that many problems, anymore. He and my little boy get along well, too, so I think we're gonna be alright where we are for now. The language is challenging, but it's not all that different from learning about tea. We do hope to see you again someday when we're ready to come back. We owe you everything for getting us here. May your tea warm your heart on the cold nights_ _…_ _and may we meet again."_

Tendo knew the risks of signing with your name and why Rumiko (he recognized her handwriting, having seen it many times) didn't put anyone's name in the letter, but the coding was clear when you looked at the way it was written. He read that Shinji's health had improved because of tea consumption and he was able to take care of his daughter better and he and Toya were able to get along. Chuckling, he was about put the letter away when something else fell out of the envelope that he didn't expect to see.

It was a photograph, taken inside a cave, and there were four people in the shadowed background. Two older kids and two younger kids. Apparently, Shinji and Rumiko took a small risk by taking a picture with their children to send to Tendo so long as there was recognizable place that could be traced. And even in the shadows, the tea shop owner could see that Shinji, despite still having the scars under his eyes and on his cheeks from the previous years, looked more alive than when they first met.

"Heh-heh," he chuckled again, and put the picture and letter away. _I hope we do meet again one day, you four. But until then, distance is best._

Hiding the letter and drinking the rest of his tea, Tendo let himself how those kids were doing where they were.

-x-

"…He probably still believes he's alive," said Gendo to Yui in his the former's office; the call to Tendo's home had originated from there.

"If he does believe this," went Fuyutsuki, who was also present when the call was made, "he'll likely keep his distance and not divulge wherever they might've gone to when he left the city last year out of concern for their safety."

"And he's right about how people have been able beat their odds at living longer," added Yui, who confirmed that tea consumption helped to improve one's lifespan.

Although Gendo was obeying the will of SEELE to have no contact with the Third Child, he was trying to find a situation that would enforce the necessity of his son's involvement with NERV against the Angels, who haven't made a move or appearance in Japan since before the Third Child left after the last Angel was defeated. So far, there was no need to bring the boy back unless an attack by the Angels reduced their chances of surviving.

What only a select few knew, however, was that each Angel's presence, their very arrival and downfall…were dependent upon the Third Child being around to pilot the Eva in Japan…and so long as he wasn't in Japan to pilot the Eva, the remaining Angels wouldn't appear, rendering NERV and the Evas virtually unnecessary for mankind's protection. This was something that Yui suspected Shinji also knew and was able to take advantage on by possibly fleeing the nation if he was still alive, keeping the people safe…by simply being away from his point of origin. If he was dead, it was no different than if he were alive.

"Still, we're just assuming a possibility," she enforced, for even she didn't know if Shinji was alive or not.

-x-

The sounds of the waves crashing against the beach were a soothing comfort the sounds of traffic jams and people shouting at other people. There was just something about living by the water that, while inviting a sense of danger, gave a feeling of tranquility. That and the taste of tea most of the time.

"Hmm…" A young man heard a female voice near him mumble as they both stirred from slumber. "Hmm… Did you sleep well again?"

"I…I slept well," the young woman heard him respond as they both got up.

"We should probably sleep in today."

"No, no, we'd be neglecting the kids."

The young man, a fifteen-year-old Shinji Ikari, more alive after he had more time to mend from his injuries and consume much tea over the last few months, got out of his and Rumiko's bed and walked out of their room.

Ever since that night in the Geo-Front, the two teens had pretty much solidified their relationship after the hurt his father inflicted upon her, Shado and Toya to get him under his control. The maternal incest victim helped the paternal rape victim through his recovery…and he helped her through her recovery and rehab after it was discovered that his father grazed a lot of muscle tissue in both her legs when he shot her.

Rumiko, almost sixteen now, hadn't really expected to be in a relationship with Shinji, or with any man that was…for all intents and purposes…not a blood relative or solely interested in her just for her body. Not to mention he was the first romantic relationship she had that was healthy for her. She almost freaked out when she was going through rehab because she feared someone had tried to get in contact with her mother and inform her on where she and Toya were. It took both Shinji and Tendo to calm her down; with her father and brother incarcerated and she and her mother not getting along, all Rumiko had was her son…and a possible endangerment to her life if her mother knew where she was and tried to come see her.

"Good morning, you two," greeted Toya to them as he stepped out of his room.

"Good morning," greeted Shado as she came out of her room, covering her mouth as she yawned. "Will you two be working today?"

Shinji and Rumiko looked at each other and both decided that it was bound to be too nice a day to spend indoors or several hours at a small business.

"…And we both rotate our work hours, so there's no need for both of us to be out and about," Rumiko told Shinji; it hadn't been too long that both of them were able to find some stability between working part time at a tea shop down the street in the small town, picking up on their education every other day and just being parents to their children and exploring where their relationship was going.

"…And it's the day before the weekend," Shinji told Rumiko. "We should spend the day at the beach or something. We live right near it."

"Shinji, it's a tropical island with no large cities," said Toya. "The whole island is one, large beach. We just don't surf."

"We need to be adept at swimming before we even take a chance at surfing," Shado stated, which she and Toya had in common because they never had much of an early opportunity to learn until after they left Japan.

Grumble! The four heard a stomach growling.

"Okay, tropical food is not a good substitute for what we're used to," Rumiko declared. "We need toast and cereal."

"And miso soup," added Shinji, who missed the taste of such a simple dish.

-x-

"…I don't think these Angels will ever appear again," went a frustrated, fourteen-year-old Asuka Langley Soryu to Ryoji Kaji during lunch time in the NERV cafeteria, venting her anger at not having anything to do beyond the synchronization testing and upgrading of Unit-02.

"It could still happen, Asuka," went Kaji to her, though even he wasn't sure if the Angels would return after the last one tried to detonate over the city in an attempt to destroy Unit-01 (or Shinji, more specifically) last year. "The Angels spent fifteen years waiting for their opportunity to strike against mankind a second time, then several weeks at a time, seemingly when we least expect them to."

"But a whole year? That's something I would expect from certain people, but not an Angel. And we can't even find them to make dealing with them easier."

"When you say 'certain people', are you referring to anyone in particular?"

"Yeah, that baby daddy Third Child."

"You know, he had every right to resign. The medical and science personnel all came to the same conclusion that if he got into the Eva once more, the high synchronization would've killed him. And his father crossed lines to get him to pilot the Eva again, even after he was duly informed of what would happen. He actually kidnapped his granddaughter and his son's girlfriend and harmed her, resulting in him getting a bite mark in his neck and two broken ribs by his son and elder brother because they were pissed with his behavior. Even if he were still alive, Commander Ikari would be prohibited from having any access to his son or granddaughter after his indifference towards them. It's a wonder he hasn't been incarcerated yet, because nobody's seen or heard from his son since he, his granddaughter, the girlfriend and her son up and left last year. These are three families that are, more or less, broken and can't be mended."

"Three families?"

"The Ikaris, Rokubungis and Gaidokus. The Ikaris because the son and granddaughter were hurt by relatives and criminals. The Rokubungis because a younger brother shattered his family out of jealousy over a nonexistent favoritism with the elder brother. And the Gaidokus because a father and son manipulated a daughter and then her mother manipulated her after she found out her daughter was pregnant. Broken families that can't be mended."

-x-

Walking down the beach after putting their kids to bed, Shinji and Rumiko just felt the need to be alone and under the night sky after a long day playing in the sand and water. It was mainly Rumiko's idea because she wanted to ask Shinji an important question.

"Say, Shinji," she started, "before we left Japan, you called me your girlfriend after you found Shado and I at that base underground. That was the first time I heard you call me your girlfriend. What made you say that?"

"Well, you were kidnapped by someone I dislike for personal reasons," he explained, actually thinking about why he said what he said when he did what he did. "He was willing to hurt you and Shado, and if anything happened to either of you or even Toya… Even I was surprised when I said it. With the exception of Shado, you're the only older girl I've ever felt comfortable talking to. I don't get tense, I don't feel my daughter being endangered by being near you… And I don't feel like I have to be cautious around you after what happened to me years ago. I actually feel safe around you."

"I feel safe around you, too, Shinji. I feel like Toya's safe around you. You and Tendo. Two men in my life that haven't hurt me or pursued me for other reasons."

Shinji knew what she meant by "other reasons". It was just like with himself. Neither was interested in the other in just a physical way, though both were attracted to each other. The young father thought of her as being beautiful, but in an appreciative way, different from how he thought of Shado as being beautiful, but in an innocent way. While the young mother thought of him as handsome in a caring way, similar to how she thought Toya being handsome in a gentlemanly way.

"How do we move beyond that measure of grief we have difficulty escaping from?" Shinji asked her, meaning what they were supposed to do when and if they had to cross that particular line.

Rumiko raised her arms up and slowly placed them on his shoulders…and tilted his head down to meet hers because he had gotten taller than her over the last eight months. She was probably crossing a different line, but she needed to let him know the extent of her own feelings for him. The young man didn't even hesitate when he felt her lips press against his; it was actually his first kiss in his entire life…and it meant a lot to him. She felt him slowly wrap his arms around her back as he came closer to her.

If only they knew that they were being watched by their children, who had snuck out of their rooms to peep at their parents through the banisters of their porch. It was the first time either child had seen their parents kiss.

"Your mother really likes Daddy, doesn't she?" Shado asked Toya.

"Yeah, she does," he answered her. "I like him, too. You think he really likes Mommy?"

"I don't think he'd be kissing her if he didn't. I don't know who really said it, but I want to believe in it. That love is true, that two people are just meant to be together."

"When love is true, nothing can tear people that care about each other apart."

They watched as their parents separated and resumed their walk down the beach as the waves came and went near their feet.

-x-

"…The UN is considering shutting NERV down within another year," Kaji told Misato on the bridge in Central Dogma.

"Oh, really?" She questioned.

"Yes. I don't blame them, though. It's been, what, over a year-and-a-half now, and no Angel alerts at all. They have their doubts that they'll ever return, that maybe the ones that did show up were the only ones that would."

"Only five Angels? While I'd be grateful for that, I wish I could stand convinced that it's all over. Unfortunately, it just seems…too easy and too early to just throw in the towel just like that."

"Same here, Katsuragi. Same here."

Sitting at one of the consoles in front of them was Ritsuko, who was running another program to update the MAGI with new information (as well as improve its search program to locate the Third Child under Commander Ikari's orders, just for the sake of ascertaining his current whereabouts), who had also heard that the UN was considering shutting the paramilitary agency down due to the lack of Angel activity. She had also been aware of the real reason the Angels had stopped coming and held a minor disgust against Shinji for walking away, even though it was his right to do so, favoring a life with his daughter over the fate of mankind. And she knew it was Commander Ikari's fault for putting his granddaughter and the female teen he had kidnapped to use as leverage against his son. Still, to have to choose between your child and the world, it was a difficult choice for some…but not so difficult for the Third Child when crossed, pressured and driven to keep a promise he made to his child that he would stop if things got too difficult for him to handle.

"…Some of the workers actually thought to go to the tea shop owned by Commander Ikari's elder brother," she heard a male worker below her say to someone else, "but they found out the shop was still closed because the owner left to take some personal time off. This left his employees with free time to relax and catch up on their school work."

"Still, you gotta admire a guy like Tendo Rokubungi for being willing to hire teens and young adults looking to learn something new, even if it's something old," a female worker responded. "My sister has a friend that works there and she says anyone looking to do something good with their usually find tea to be a good first step in the right direction. I heard that one of the men that work there has a record and is now just looking to keep out of trouble. It's being hoped that it'll open back up in about another week."

"Any guesses on why the owner decided to take a vacation?" Another female worker asked.

"One belief is to find a new strain of plant that could be used to make tea," the male worker answered, "while another is just to attend an event out of the country."

Ritsuko decided to look into this…just for the sake of knowing the whereabouts of Commander Ikari's elder brother.

-x-

It was just a small commitment ceremony. Not exactly a wedding until they were both much older, but still, Tendo didn't want to miss it after receiving another well-masked letter from Shinji and Rumiko inviting him. He had hopes for the two teen parents' relationship, wanting to believe that they could make it work out for the long run. Plus, he missed them after seeing their picture and seeing that his nephew was progressing well in his recovery from all that tea consumption he'd been doing.

"Were you nervous about today?" He asked Rumiko, seeing her standing by the banister of the front of the porch whilst watching Shinji playing with Shado and Toya.

"Very," she answered him as he came to join her. "But if I can survive a commitment ceremony, then I'm sure to survive the real thing when we're older. How are things with the tea shop?"

"Business is smaller than it was last year, but I still see people come and go for tea and pastries. I couldn't ask for more."

As they watched Shinji get pushed to the ground by a wave, Shado laughed at how her father got partially soaked.

"You know, if what Shinji believes to be true," she told Tendo, reminding him what her future husband informed them of last year, "then all we have to do is wait another year-and-a-half before we can come back to Japan."

"I've not forgotten," he assured her, "but it's a huge gamble, though. Two-Thousand-Fifteen and Two-Thousand-Sixteen being the period where all this insanity we found ourselves where unforgivable things happen just to satisfy a few madmen. But if it's true, and those two years are when this craziness occurs…then the years that follow Two-Thousand-Sixteen will be the years we can expect for things to no longer be a problem."

"Imagine it if it were true, though. No more giant monsters, no more end of the world. Just people going on without much fear of the unknown. And all we have to do…is keep Shinji away from Japan until that bad time passes, then his parents can't exploit him, anymore. I hold onto that hope."

"Same here, Rumiko," he told her; if it was true, and they could all come back after all this time away, they would both be free from what tied them to the past.

Shinji would be able to walk away from the cruel destiny his parents tried to force on him that was to decide the fate of everyone on the planet (something Tendo couldn't help but feel was the craziest of expectations any parent could have for their child)…and Rumiko would at least be of age where she didn't have to put up with her mother any longer because she would be old enough to officially live on her own and keep her son away from her. All he could do was hope that would all happen in the months to follow.

"Say, Rumiko," he uttered to the young woman as she looked down at the small ring on her finger that Shinji got her two weeks ago. "I'm thinking of stepping down as the owner of the tea shop in a few years."

"Really?" She asked him, concerned. "But why?"

"I guess it's just a sign of old age," he confessed. "Maybe seven years from now. But when that does happen, I'm hoping that someone else would care to run the shop when I do step down. Do you think you and Shinji would be interested in it?"

Rumiko smiled and responded, "I'll ask Shinji what he thinks about it. Seven years is a long time. Many things can happen from now into the next day. But I'm sure he'd be interested. It's a simple life. Nothing means more to the both of than a simple life for our family."

"Yeah. The simple life."

They then looked at Shinji as he and the kids came back from the beach, both toddlers on the young man's back.

"Hey, you two!" Rumiko raised her voice. "You know he's not strong enough to carry the both of you yet! Why are you tormenting him?"

"It's okay," Shinji told her as he stepped onto the porch and let Shado and Toya down and catch his breath. "It was my idea. My chest and shoulders have healed up well, so carrying people isn't much of a problem, anymore."

Rumiko came over and dropped to her knees and hugged Shinji.

"My knight in shining armor," she called him.

"Please, you two," Shado kindly pleaded as she wrung her hair of water onto the wooden floorboards. "Get a room for that."

"Uh, yes, please," added Toya afterward. "Get a room."

The teens looked up at Tendo with some degree of accusation. All the elder did was wave his hands and shook his head in the negative; he didn't want to get involved in this petty nonsense, no matter how trivial and humorous it might've been.

-x-

"…We have to consider the possibility that the Third Child is alive out there somewhere," said Ritsuko to Gendo and Fuyutsuki in the former's office.

"If he's alive, he's staying away from the city," went Fuyutsuki. "Maybe even the whole country if he claims to be aware of what's going on."

"If he knows what's going, then he also knows we're critical of time here," Gendo stated.

The three were aware of the scenario that Gendo had that required the boy to be around NERV from at least the summer of Twenty-Fifteen to Twenty-Sixteen, when the Angels would be around and then the Instrumentality Project could take place afterward. But if the Third Child knew, then he was purposely keeping away until that time passed and their window of opportunity was no longer accessible. All they had now were a few months until Twenty-Seventeen, and nothing in the Dead Sea Scrolls stated anything about the years following Twenty-Sixteen, which meant that there was, quite possibly, nothing in store for mankind that dealt with either the Angels or Human Instrumentality, not even a prophesied Third Impact. Mankind would be in a virtual dead-end for all eternity, and all because of a damaged boy that couldn't follow orders.

But Fuyutsuki was considering being relieved because of Shinji's unwillingness to do as instructed or follow his father's orders, regardless of what the future brought in the next few months. Ever since he showed up with his daughter, he felt nothing but sympathy for the young man that just wanted to protect his daughter from harm and keep her close. And then, there were the young girl he met over a year ago and her son…and how Gendo treated all four with the aim of manipulating his son to get back into the Eva, knowing it would kill him. He and Gendo could barely be in the same room for more than an hour after turning the commander in for his unlawful actions against his son and granddaughter and their friends.

Ritsuko, on the other hand, was left at a standstill with this discovery. If everything continued to go the way they were going, then everything they did would be for naught. NERV would no longer be necessary, and neither would the MAGI. The Third Child would put them out of a job with his absence.

"I recommend we bring in the tea shop owner and interrogate him for the location of the Third Child," she suggested.

"The chances of him telling us anything are slim, Dr. Akagi," Fuyutsuki informed her; he respected Tendo Rokubungi and didn't want to cross him for as long as they both might live in their respective old ages. "Plus, we have no authority to question a simple tea shop owner."

This meant that NERV was under orders from SEELE to not bother with Tendo after learning he and Gendo were estranged brothers and that there was bad blood between the two. Even if Tendo knew something, messing with a tea shop owner that was going to bite the dust sooner or later was not worth the hassle.

Gendo was silent throughout the bickering. He had lost all control over the situation, and had no means to rectify it.

-x-

Burst! Shinji, now adept at swimming, surfaced in the ocean water after spending nearly seven minutes underwater, being timed by Rumiko.

"That was good!" Rumiko shouted as he swam back to the beach with a small wave. "Six minutes and fifteen seconds."

Then, they both looked down at his chest, which no longer looked so different from a regular teen's chest that had recovered remarkably from the scarring and left only a faded discoloration that would've healed up with more time and tea consumption. Even the awful, star-shaped scar that was originally there had faded almost to nothing. It was something Shinji was most relieved about; he didn't feel much shame and the need to cover up.

Their children, several feet from the water, building sandcastle sculptures and a trench to bring in water from the ocean waves every now and then.

"How long until you think he's all better?" Toya asked Shado, building another castle structure with a pale.

"Maybe several more weeks," she answered him. "You can't rush healing any faster than possible. You can't heal a broken leg unless you let the bones set first. The same applies to old scars like Daddy's. He can only heal at a steady pace."

Toya looked at their parents and how Shinji placed his arms on his chest and smiled.

"…I'll watch Shado and Toya at the tea shop tomorrow while you're at school," he heard Shinji say to his mother, who then kissed him on his lips.

"Eh-heh-heh," Toya chuckled.

"Whoa!" The children heard their parents gasp, seeing them get washed to the ground by a large wave. "Aw, come on!"

"Eh-heh-heh!" They snickered at their soaked parents.

-x-

Tendo found it odd that Ms. Katsuragi, once he returned from his time away from Japan to open the tea shop, would visit the shop and stay until closing time, and order three different types of tea. When the last of his employees signed out for the day, he approached the purple-haired woman.

"I take it you're not here for just the tea, Ms. Katsuragi," he told her. "What brings you here?"

"I needed to ask you something personal," she responded. "Something that only you would know, being a personal person."

Gathering her empty tea cups, Tendo uttered, "I'm pretty sure whatever questions you have for me are impossible to answer due to the personal boundaries surrounding. My relationship with Gendo is permanently strained because of what he did to our family over twenty years ago. I had a wife and daughter that didn't survive Second Impact. The thought of getting married a second time never came across my mind. What is left to tell?"

"Do you think your nephew is still alive?" She asked him.

"Why ask me that?"

"Because I'm not sure what to believe. I know that NERV crossed many lines by forcing the boy into a situation he had no understanding of…and we didn't know he had a child until after she raised her voice out of concern for him."

"Blame the people that don't do what they're supposed to do when they have children of their own. Blame the ones that don't review all the information there should be available on someone. Knowledge isn't power, it's a tool to help us when we need it. It grants freedom to those in need of guidance. If it's kept from others, if it's manipulated for reasons immoral, then it serves no other purpose than to prove one's cruelty."

Misato was then reminded that Gendo was likely the very reason that NERV had lacked many details surrounding Shinji and absolutely no details surrounding his daughter until after the fact, after the Angel battle. And even then, it seemed like the lack of information had been manipulated, like they weren't supposed to know anything about them, that the boy had been kidnapped for ransom, that one of his kidnappers raped him and later had his child in prison before dying, almost similar to the absolute lack of knowledge on the First Child, Rei Ayanami. Even to this very day, Misato didn't know anything about the albino, blue-haired girl like she did Asuka, the only child whose file NERV had that wasn't lacking.

"…I just believe that he's somewhere far from here and trying to enjoy life with his daughter," Tendo told her. "If it means staying away from his parents and others, then it must be a tolerable life where he can…be healthy."

"You make it seem like a terrible thing to be near his mother."

"I won't comment on that."

"Hey, we all have our issues with our parents."

"One of them…or both of them?"

"It depends on the person with the issues."

"Well said."

Misato then took out her wallet and threw down some yen, paying for her tea.

"The jasmine and ginger tea were great, by the way," she explained to him as she got up. "I may have to quit drinking."

"If you wish to live a long life, you should," he told her. "Alcoholism leads to liver and kidney failure if done in the long term."

"Ugh," she shuddered, now picturing herself in a hospital bed hooked to machines in order to stay alive. "Have a nice night."

-x-

Shinji awoke in the silence of the night and found himself unable to bear looking up at the wooden ceiling above him and Rumiko. He moved to get out of the bed and stepped out of their room to go to the kitchen for a cup of milk.

"Can't sleep, either?" He heard Shado ask him, seeing her sitting at the countertop with a cup of milk in front of her.

"I woke up from an old dream I had a long time ago," he told her, taking the carton of milk out of the refrigerator and pouring himself a cup as he sat beside her. "What got you up?"

"A recent dream I had," she explained to him her reason for being up so late at night.

"Oh? What was it about?"

"I saw you…or I saw someone like you. A little boy with a sword. You were facing a lady that wasn't very nice to anyone…and you were being supported by several people to do something about the lady. And there was something being said several times by everyone. They kept saying, _"There can be only one"_. It seemed like a sort of battle between good and bad…and you were the side of good…only little."

"A little boy like me, with a sword, facing an unfriendly lady? That seems like a cool dream, Shado. What happened in the end?"

"That's what got me up a while ago. I woke up just as you and the lady were about to face off. I didn't see who was likely to be the winner or how the battle ended. But I was hoping for you to be the victor. There was another lady in the dream that seemed to like you a lot called you something that seemed to fit, but I don't know what it means. She called you Little Ronin. What is a ronin?"

Shinji recalled an earlier time in the past, from before they went to Tokyo-3, where she asked him something one of their relatives had called her that she heard once. His daughter asked what a bastard was, not knowing yet that the word referred to her status as the child of an unmarried pair because her mother, or rather, the woman that carried her for eight-nine months before dying, had harmed her father. But it was a child's nature to be curious and want to know the meaning behind certain words, something he couldn't fault her for.

"A ronin is what you call a samurai or a swordsman that wanders around without a master to serve," he answered her. "A samurai without a master, devoted only to their sword."

"I kinda like the designation in the dream I had," she said after a short while to think about the revelation of the word's meaning. "And you seemed very calm. Hey, we're ronin ourselves, aren't we?"

"Yeah, Shado," he realized after she asked him. "Yeah, we are ronin."

Or rather, Shinji and Rumiko were ronin; they both didn't listen to their parents or guardians…and were disinterested in reconciling with them due to personal pain.

"Daddy…you're going to be alright now, right?" Shado asked her father.

Her question came from a place of devotion and concern.

"We'll know for certain in about another week," he told her; Shinji had a private doctor that kept his identity confidential to keep anyone looking for them from finding them, and also to confirm for themselves that Shinji was recovering from his Eva-related injuries and would be able to live a full life, whether or not he stuck to his current diet of tea consumption. "Until then, I'll say this to my baby girl. I'm doing my best not to go anywhere I know I shouldn't just yet."

Shado smiled and finished her milk.

"This little ronin is going back to bed now," she told him, getting up and putting her cup in the sink. "Good night."

"Good night. I love you." He told her, still drinking his cup.

He thought of his own dream he woke up from earlier. In his dream, he saw himself, looking at a large city that seemed desolate, standing beside a white horse with a horn on its head. The strangest thing was how he looked in the dream: He was dressed in a variation of traditional Japanese attire, something like a hakama comprised of black pants and a coat with a white undershirt, as though he were attending a funeral, but had several weapons on him that made him seem like a strange sort of thug. A shotgun on his back, two pistols at his waist and a bandolier of shotgun shells and some spiked knuckles on his hands, the person he saw in his dream had to be a force to be reckoned with if crossed.

 _I wouldn't mind being a little bit tougher, but not a killer,_ he thought, the last thing he saw in his dream before waking up was the guy that resembled him in the company of a little girl he had never seen before, looking like she was Japanese, but her hair was blond.

-x-

"…It would seem that what we have planned for all these years has been for naught," went SEELE 01 to the other council members during their next meeting to discuss the lack of time to achieve their grand design.

"The Human Instrumentality Project is impossible to implement without the destruction of the remaining Angels," said SEELE 06, "and their arrival was dependent upon the presence of the Third Child, whom we cannot locate anywhere."

"Even if he hadn't piloted an Evangelion again, his presence alone would have attracted the Angels to Tokyo-3," added SEELE 10. "This is all Ikari's fault. He crossed lines, withheld information vital to our agenda, all to manipulate his son, which failed when things got out of hand with the dangers of using the Eva with zero guarantees of it being safe to use long-term."

"Only because it had never been thoroughly tested to work with a male subject like it had been with female subjects," went SEELE 03. "Since the Third Child abandoned NERV, there have been no further attempts to use boy pilots to operate the Evas."

"And the Dummy System was never implemented due to the lack of research done on the synchronization testing between the Third Child and the other two pilots," added SEELE 12. "Everything has been either postponed or delayed beyond our capacity to achieve. Even by some miracle we were able to resolve these problems, only the years Twenty-Fifteen and Twenty-Sixteen were our window of opportunity to make our goal a reality. We cannot achieve such with only two months left out of this year."

"What can we do?" SEELE 02 asked.

"We've done all we can," responded SEELE 01 in a defeated tone. "Disband NERV. Shut down the Evangelion Project and all other projects relating to it."

-x-

"…The UN is finally shutting NERV down?" Misato asked Kaji.

"I just found out myself," he responded as he sat down in the cafeteria to eat. "They don't believe the Angels will return and see no further point in funding NERV and the Evangelions."

"We're basically out of a job because of the lack of Angel activity."

"Yeah. Honestly, though, many are feeling relieved, that what happened sixteen years ago is finally over. Not everyone wanted to deal with the Angels for the rest of their lives…except for Asuka, perhaps."

"She's going to be upset when they shut down Unit-02."

But the worst part of this for Kaji was that with NERV being disbanded, he wouldn't be able to get closer to his personal adjective to discover the truth behind what caused Second Impact and why a lot of people were killed in the process. Even with the lack of Angel activity after in the weeks following Shinji's resignation, the furthest he was able to get were the discovery of the creature that he believed to be Adam hidden down in Terminal Dogma and salvaged records of the Katsuragi Expedition in the Antarctic. And now, he was likely to never get the full truth.

-x-

Adam, once an almighty behemoth from which the Evas take their physical appearance, the source of life for the Angels and rival and equal to Lilith, was more or less useless now with the time wasted by the lack of the remaining Angels appearing. He had deteriorated into pulp in the last few days. And this left Gendo even more displeased with the fact that his original scenario was now impossible to achieve; even if Yui had returned some time after Shinji left, there was still the chance that she could be taken from him a second time, and wanted to achieve Instrumentality to prevent that from ever happening to him again.

"With Adam no more, there's no reason for the remaining Angels to bother with us," said Fuyutsuki to Gendo, looking down at the case where Adam's remains resided.

Even Yui's Adam Project, which designed the Evas themselves, had been dependent upon Adam more so than it had been on Lilith (who hadn't deteriorated just yet), since purely mechanical constructs paled in comparison to the cybernetic organisms the Evas represented.

"There's no way to move forward now," went Yui, who was also present in Gendo's office.

-x-

When Rumiko went to the mailbox and took out the mail present for the day, she found a letter addressed to the alias Shinji used from the doctor's office. This was most likely the letter that she and Shinji had been anticipating for a long time. Sighing, she rushed back to the house and found Shinji sitting at the kitchen table, eating a grilled cheese sandwich.

"Shinji, it looks like your letter has finally arrived," she told him, sitting across the table from him and placed the letter in front of him.

The young man set his sandwich down and picked the letter up.

"Here's to hope," he uttered, opening the envelope and pulling the folded piece of paper out. "Oh, boy."

Rumiko watched him unfold it, hoping that her love interest could enjoy life without having a troublesome chain attached to him. She believed in him doing right by all of them, that his will to just be there for his daughter, Toya and herself would suffice for the unwritten future yet to transpire for them. A short moment came and went as he read it, leaving the young woman mentally grasping at straws as the suspense was pounding at her heart. And then she watched him set the letter down.

"Well, Shinji?" She asked him, worried.

He slid the letter over to her and expressed, "Apart from just another month of tea consumption…I can expect to live a full life with all of you."

She looked at his results…and smiled at his clean bill of health.

"I'm gonna go check on the kids now," she told him, wiping a tear from her left eye.

"Rumiko," he stopped her for a moment.

"Yes?"

"I love you."

It wasn't everyday any girl like her heard those words from a man that loved her. Really loved her and not for selfish or depraved reasons. She smiled again and him.

"I love you, too," she told him.

-x-

"…So, Asuka," went Misato to the redhead as they stood beside the gate to the latter's flight back to Germany, "what will you do?"

"That's the thing of it," the girl responded. "I have no idea what to do."

With NERV getting disbanded, Asuka was infuriated to know that Unit-02 would be placed in storage to gather dust. Throughout her entire life, she had been enforced to devote herself to the Eva, and now she had to find something else to pass the time.

"Well, you're still young, so you'll have plenty of opportunities to find your future career," Misato assured her.

"What of you and First?"

Misato would likely transfer to a military branch far from Tokyo-3…while Rei would…just continue her schooling until she graduated.

"Who knows?" She responded.

-x-

It was funny how Ritsuko seemed cut loose from her mother's successful MAGI. She just shut it down, and already she was ready to leave NERV to pursue other interests. At least she wouldn't have to see Rei's face again if there was nothing scientific to achieve.

"…See you around," she heard Maya say to her co-workers as they left Central Dogma.

-x-

"…Ugh, that bad man is going to hurt a lot of people," went Toya as he responded to his mother's expressing of some guy running for president.

"At least we don't believe in him or political parties," said Shinji as all four of them sat down for lunch. "If this former First Lady doesn't win, we can always hope for a short run since this guy isn't very popular with the majority of the nation. Rumiko?"

"I want to believe in a little bit of girl power, but then I'd have to hope for someone to dig up dirt on this guy that's actually true," Rumiko told him as she set down Shado's bowl of miso soup. "Nothing hurts a person's chances at success more than their dishonesty."

"What is dishonesty?" Shado asked.

"It's when a person or people lie about things instead of telling the truth," Toya answered her. "Except certain people tend to get away with dishonesty rather than honesty sometimes."

"Only if others let them get away with it," Shinji explained, taking a bite out of a dumpling.

"May the lady win," said Rumiko.

"To the lady," the other three agreed.

-x-

Rei Ayanami looked at the dismembered remains of the former Dummy System, suspecting that Dr. Akagi had a hand in this devastation before she left the Geo-Front. She was one of the few people left down at NERV HQ that had yet to leave, and she was among the rare few that had no other purpose than what she had initially been intended for before the Third Child abandoned them all. With no Angels, there was no longer a need for the Evas, and without the need for the Evas, there was no longer a need for her. The girl was at a loss for what to do with the rest of her life deprived of purpose.

"Rei…" She heard Commander Ikari behind her and turned to face him. "I knew I'd find you down here."

She walked over to him and stopped two feet in front of him.

"We'll be relocating to Fukuoka in a week," he told her.

Rei didn't say anything, but it was understood that Commander Ikari and his wife would be taking her with them when they left.

-x-

It was a new year…and Shinji Ikari, for all intents and purposes, felt that he was finally free of the cruel destiny his parents tried to manipulate him into fulfilling against the world. Twenty-Seventeen, a clean slate for everyone to move on. No more Angels to face, no more Evas to pilot, no more lies and arrogant behavior to hide a darker agenda. And the USA had their first female president to lead them over a guy that seemed completely ill-suited for the important duty to serve the people.

Standing out on the front porch of their house, the young man caught the first glimpse of the rising sun with his girlfriend and their children.

"So beautiful," said Toya, covering his eyes from the full sight of the hot star.

"Ah," went Shado, glad she had washed her eyes out before stepping onto the porch and sitting on the banister. "The brightest I've ever seen."

"The brightest any of us have seen," claimed Rumiko.

Shinji chuckled as he leaned on the banister left of Shado.

-x-

 _Three years later_

As Tendo felt weak in his knees and sat down, he thought back to the three years after the end of Twenty-Sixteen that the business got back to booming for the tea shop. Yet, he still felt the shop was understaffed because a lot of people came in for tea and pastries after they got wind of some new flavors. Even with the minor expansion by building a second tea shop just further down the street from the primary shop and being able to afford more staff, the elderly man still felt outnumbered. And a depressing factor of the customers was that the majority of them were adults and rarely any of them had any children with them; rarely any people had children these days.

"…What can I get you?" One of his female workers asked someone he wasn't looking at.

"Uh, one jasmine, two ginger and one ginseng, please," responded a man's voice, which sounded familiar to the elder. "And four muffins, please."

"I don't think this place has ever been so lively with customers," a second female voice uttered.

"After the uptick in beverage sales and filming, Tokyo-3 has changed drastically over the last two-and-a-half-years," the female worker explained. "Even though we added coffee to our beverage options, people love tea more. We're overwhelmed by the supply and demand for tea."

"Whatever happened to Tendo? Tendo Rokubungi? The elder that started the tea shop?"

"He's been managing, but now he's barely getting around."

Tendo sighed and picked up his cup of tea.

"Why do you ask?" The worker asked.

"My mother was hoping to get rehired by him after having to leave a few years ago," a little boy's voice expressed, to which Tendo turned his head to face the source, seeing a little boy…and a little girl…and two young adults that were definitely familiar to him. "He had saved her from making a bad choice when she left home a long time ago."

The little girl, sporting longer ebony hair that was tied into a ponytail, looked up at Tendo and uttered, "He looked like you do, sir."

The other three looked at him.

"Rumiko?" He asked the young woman.

"Tendo?" She responded.

"It's been a long time. I didn't think I'd see you or Toya again."

"What about us two?" The girl, Shado, asked, referring to herself and Shinji.

"Heh-heh. Look at you four. Look at you, Shinji. You're…you're so enduring."

"A lot of tea, a lot of time away to recover…and a will to stay with loved ones goes a long way," the man, Shinji, explained his full recovery. "But what of you? How have you been?"

"I've missed each of you. I kept hoping you'd come back one day. I'm glad you did."

"I'm glad we came back, too. Is there any chance you're hiring?"

"What happened to that other tea shop?"

"We were let go of," said Rumiko, still bitter about the reason they were let go of.

"But I thought you two were doing well over there."

"That's the thing. We were doing just fine. It was the managers that were doing wrong. Who continues to commingle funds? Nobody commingles funds, anymore…except perhaps those that try to."

"Everyone was let go of," Shinji revealed, much to both his and Rumiko's embarrassment and disappointment. "I got my degrees in home economics and culinary arts and Rumiko got her degrees in economics and agriculture."

"We both have our successes," Rumiko sighed.

"Eh-heh-heh," Tendo chuckled. "Shinji, I would hire…but Rumiko was never fired or resigned from here. She still has her job."

"Really?" Rumiko questioned. "I… Thank you, Tendo."

"Don't mention it."

-x-

 _Epilogue_

The cemetery used to be so desolate, like a giant desert or scar that held not so much as a weed, but that was long ago. It was now carpeted with grass and flowers, with a few years worth of snow that had returned turning the obsidian grave markers grayish and like marble stone. Standing in front of one such grave marker was a man in his late-thirties, holding a bouquet of flowers, accompanied by a woman in her early-forties, holding his right hand.

"A lot has changed in Tokyo-3," the man said in front of the grave. "The government actually reopened the Geo-Front after so many years, but for the purpose of trying ways to recreate the Antarctic and reclaim the coastal areas of the world."

"Some people that work down there have actually employed evaporation techniques and artificial lunar gravity to actually push and pull the waters…with some success," added the woman as she let go of the man's hand so that he could place down the bouquet in front of the grave. "Our kids are still arguing over what they will be when they grow up, but something tells us that Shado is going to win the argument with being a people doctor."

The man, Shinji, turned to face her and chuckled.

"Pediatrician, Rumiko," he corrected her. "Still, there is nothing wrong with research into renewable energy sources. We no longer need nuclear power plants after the creation of plasma energy plants to replace them. And we're cleaning up the ocean of the garbage from years of buildup, too. People are actually trying to leave behind a better world for everyone."

The grave they were in front of was Tendo's; it was three years ago that the estranged brother of Gendo Ikari had succumbed to natural causes, triggered by an unexpected heart attack. Both Shinji and Rumiko were devastated by his death; he was the first adult they felt they could trust and was the first person that had any belief in their being victims of others and had every right to a good life, no matter who disagreed with them. But with Rumiko, it was like losing the closest thing she had to an unrelated, sympathetic grandfather who saved her life. With Shinji, it was losing an uncle that really cared, never put him or his daughter down or anything.

"Rumiko and I… We're considering building a third shop because everyone's tea-crazy these days," Shinji told the grave; before they got married, Tendo left his nephew and employee the tea business, entrusting it to them. "And there's something else we wanted to tell you. Uh, Rumiko?"

Rumiko carefully lowered to her knees onto the soft grass and placed her left hand on the grave marker, sighing.

"Shinji and I are having a child together soon," she said to the grave, then chuckled.

Both parents were nervous…and worried. Mostly because Rumiko, just like Shinji in the beginning, had been bothered by the fact that they did it only three times after getting used to being that intimate with her husband. While Shinji just wanted for there to not be any jealousy between Shado, Toya and the new baby, even though they were older and knew they weren't being replaced.

"What do you think it'll be like?" Shinji asked Rumiko, wanting her opinion about the baby's future. "Rumiko?"

"What do I think? Well, I think if I know the men and women in my family, the baby will be a great person, just like their father." She answered him.

"Thank you."

As they stood back up in front of Tendo's grave, they bowed their heads in respect to their deceased elder and turned to leave the overgrown cemetery.

Shinji turned his head to the left of a bunch of the graves…and thought he saw a woman standing in front of some. She had a pageboy hairstyle and…at first seemed familiar, like he had seen her from somewhere before.

"Shinji?" Rumiko got his attention, turning his head to face her. "Is something wrong?"

He turned back to look at the woman, but she was gone.

"No," he responded, turning back to face her. "Just old memories."

"You're sure?"

Seeing nobody else nearby in the cemetery with them, Shinji nodded in the positive.

"Just thought I saw a ghost from my past," he explained. "A woman that left me before her husband did for a future I didn't believe in."

Rumiko knew her husband was referring to his mother, Yui Ikari, whom she couldn't help but feel pity and disgust at for leaving her son alone just to serve as a meaningless soul for the cybernetic monster she and her husband forced him to pilot against other monsters just to ensure two different futures that were as cruel as any of their other relatives before they had their children were to them. If anything, she felt that Yui was in a similar boat to her own mother, forcing Shinji to suffer like how her mother forced her have Toya just so that there was another man in their family. Her husband confided in her about everything he recalled and discovered from his damaged past and how much it affected him to want to keep from following in the cruel destiny they had outlined for him.

There were times during her rehab to walk properly again where she could hear him cry at night, and she would have to use crutches to carry herself to his side of the room just to hold him like she would Toya whenever he cried at night. These were the times where she had to remember that Shinji, despite his maturity, despite his concerns for his daughter's well-being, was still a boy that had, in many respects, lost his mother and couldn't connect with her.

She gave him a small smile and hugged him.

"Come on," she suggested to him, gently pulling him her way. "We still have four hours before our kids come home. That can be time spent either serving tea at the shop…or having fun someplace fun-related."

As they walked away, they were being watched by the same woman that Shinji saw, who merely hid behind a tree that had grown over the years in the cemetery after vegetation started to sprout and spread across it. If they had stayed to wander, they would've noticed that it was Yui Ikari, unchanged since the day of her return, cursed to walk the Earth until all of mankind was gone, as a literal testament of their existence.

 _At least he's happy,_ she thought, having discovered that her son was still alive, and now he was more alive than he had been when he was a toddler. _And with a family of his own._

She could've made an attempt to try to get near him, to talk to him, but she chose not to. If he was happy with the way things were, then that was that, even if she felt they were all wrong; there would always be times where children would disagree with their parents, and they were no exception to that belief.

Standing in front of the graves of her losses, Yui wasn't sure if this was her punishment for leaving her son or a twisted variation of her original intention, to live as eternal proof of mankind's existence, and was just being shown by the higher powers that be what was in store for her until the end of existence. In the years following her return, she had lost her husband to a car accident, her former mentor to natural causes brought on by his advancing age, and her surrogate daughter to a mysterious sickness brought on by her hybrid nature as a human/Lilith organism. And perhaps, when she thought about the depths of how far she had been willing to go with the Adam Project before it was shut down with everything else NERV and SEELE had been doing, a little bit of her own sanity. And if this was her punishment by the very deities themselves, then she knew she deserved it all.

"All of this for a bright future for all of mankind," she heard someone say behind her, and turned to face them.

It was Shinji…and his wife, who had decided to make sure what her husband saw was a ghost.

"It could've been great," she claimed to him.

"No, it wouldn't," went Rumiko to her. "Say it did happen? Say you managed to pull it off? What would the outcome be? How would it affect everyone? I keep having nightmares where the world is empty, all save a few people. Mostly just children that don't know what happened around them. I see one of them is my son, and he can't find me anywhere. How do you know that wouldn't have happened?"

"Another possible outcome is that the world doesn't change," Shinji told her. "The world doesn't change…but everyone that exists in it gets removed for a time, only to come back with absolutely no memory of anything before they were taken. No memories of loss, of joy, not even of people that matter to them. Just…nothingness. You can't guarantee that wouldn't have happened, either, or that the world would've just turned into a barren wasteland if I had stayed all those years ago. You were playing a dangerous game where not everything was guaranteed to go your way. I found out without even wanting to, and did what I did to stop being a part of that game. When you're caught between one dangerous choice and another dangerous choice, a rock and a hard place, that is, you either choose the lesser of the two evils…or you walk away and hope nothing really happens if you do."

"And nothing really did happen…and won't happen," Yui responded. "Fate was intended to change everything in Twenty-Fifteen and Twenty-Sixteen. When you left, you prevented every alternative outcome from happening. The Angels stopped coming…and won't ever be seen again. Your absence shut down an entire paramilitary agency tasked with defending the world…and all you did was walk away,"

"I had to keep a promise I made to my daughter when I turned away. If things got bad, no matter what everyone said, I was done with NERV. Well, things got bad…and I was done. And look at the way things have changed because of a different choice made. Things are getting better now."

"Maybe not the way you or your husband had intended," Rumiko expressed, "but at least we can find happiness in this life now."

And Yui believed her son's wife. They had found happiness together, even if it meant throwing away an ideal plan that had been made before their time and had required the suffering of countless lives in the beginning. And in a world that was slowly-but-surely rebuilding itself from the brink of ruination.

"And we get to see our children smile all the time," Shinji told her, and then the two turned to leave, but Shinji stopped to turn back at her. "For a very long time after that day we left Japan, I've hated the both of you for what you did and tried to do. Even after the years you intended to be the deciding fate of everyone's future, whether they agreed with your ideals or not, had come and gone, I tried to find a reason to continue hating you afterwards. But I can't go to my grave in the future while continuing to hate you…because I'd be damaging my relationships with my own family as time goes on. So I'll just say what needs to be said. As much…as I resent you for trying to use me in the beginning…I forgive you for your transgressions, Mother."

It sounded like it was hard for him to say those words, but Yui felt that he had to so that he wasn't weighed down by further emotional baggage. Even when nothing went the way they were supposed to go, he had at least forgiven her.

When she bowed her head to him, he turned and left with Rumiko, leaving her alone with her losses. Her losses, not his losses.

"How do you feel now?" Rumiko asked him.

"Released from all that hatred I kept buried," he answered her. "Was it wrong of me to forgive her for her wrongs?"

"No, Shinji," she told him, meaning every word. "You weren't wrong. I just wish it was easy for me to forgive my parents and brother for their wrongs. But…some things are better left unsaid and undone."

"Maybe one day, Rumiko. Just hold onto hope. There's still time before Shado and Toya get out of school. Shall we go home and watch a film?"

"Yeah. Or…we could just…go back to bed."

"Really? And I thought we both agreed that we were uncomfortable with that part of our lives."

"I guess some habits really do die hard."

"Eh-heh-heh. Okay, I just hope it isn't something that becomes addictive as we get older."

"I just hope nothing bad happens to you or our children as I get older."

Hand in hand, they walked out of the cemetery and back towards Tokyo-3, which was still going through the debate of whether or not to rename it into New Tokyo to get away from the numeral system after new techniques into neutralizing nuclear radiation had cleansed more than half of what the original Tokyo had been left as due to Second Impact. The happy couple, once a pair of children maimed by the people of their past, looking into the future full of hope with each passing day.

The End…or it?

A/N: I'll leave it at that until I hear from all of you what you think I should do about it. Create a new story based off this one or create an entirely new alternate to the original story? Also, what do you think should happen later on? Should Yui be permitted to pass on and not be eternal proof of mankind's existence? Should I reveal what became of Misato, Ritsuko, Kaji and Asuka? Should there be a chapter of Shinji and Rumiko at the hospital with their baby? I leave it up you.


End file.
